Consider my position in life before I say this: I am not wealthy and generally barely make due.
I dislike the idea of any sort of wealth redistribution. Strife and poverty are necessary parts of a society based around human nature. Welfare spawns laziness and a lack of ambition. As a race, we would slowly drift off into senility in such a situation.
Leave me the option to predate on my fellow man, and for him to do the same. The smart and the strong should thrive, not everyone.
Interesting response, and a viewpoint I think shared by many, though perhaps not as many would be so brave to be explicit and open about it. I appreciate you naming your awareness about your theory of human nature.
Personally, I'm curious to unpack why "welfare spawns laziness and lack of ambition." What are the assumptions underpinning this claim, and what do you mean by "laziness" and "lack of ambition?"
If, for instance, my ambition is centered around connecting with those around me and wanting to benefit them, then that would not wane according to my own welfare; it would only decrease if everybody else's welfare was high, in which case this criteria for "justice as fairness" would be met and I would be happy.
While I agree that perhaps some amount of inequality is likely necessary, the question those in the original position above are asking is "how much?" The agreement they came up with is "only enough so that the poorest are the least poor they can be."
The book this idea comes from is HUGE, so even though my post was super long about it, I left a lot out. Rawls also gives arguments for why the spirit council in the original position would favor principles leading to a stable society, and that this principle of raising those lowest as high as possible would effectively do that.
As far as reality today goes, I think right now we're seeing globally that people are really rejecting the inequalities we have today, like in the demonstrations at the G20 right now in Hamburg.
It has become obvious that when people have something handed to them, they won't bother trying to learn how or work hard to get it themselves. Nature loves competition.
As an example, look at big business when they are the only part of a market. With nothing to compete with, they simply stagnate on innovation.
Most of mankind's greatest advances came through war or technology stemming from war-based innovation.
I think you could certainly have structures that encourage a competitive business environment without having 1/6 kids in the USA wondering where their next meal is coming from, poverty and homelessness at the rates we have them, or minority oppression the way we have them.
As for what happens "when people have something handed to them," and how that relates to those worst-off in society, I think we'll get some more information about that in the next couple years as more places are beginning to experiment with universal basic experiment.
"Nature loves competition" is an assumption about nature - and about human nature - that may or may not be true. Personally, I'm not convinced, and it is at least also true that "nature loves cooperation," and that both innovation and the health of any ecosystem result also from cooperation, symbiotic and synergistic relationships.