Australians want opportunity, not equality

In an article about Labor MP Andrew Leigh's latest book, Battlers and Billionaires, economics editor of The Sydney Morning Herald Ross Gittins claims that Australian egalitarianism has become a 'façade.'

According to Gittins, evidence of increasing income inequality shows that Australia is slipping from its egalitarian moorings. Since the late 1970s, the share of income going to the top 1% of earners has increased from 5% to approximately 9%, while Australia now has the 9th highest level of inequality among 34 leading industrialised nations.

Leigh's stories of Australian streets where the typical house sells for more than $7 million and a Porsche 911 or a Maserati Quattroporte is de rigueur are certainly powerful fodder for class warriors.

However, concerns about rising income inequality are misplaced.

At the heart of Australian egalitarianism is the ideal of a fair go for all: Everyone should have the opportunity to improve their position in society with the right combination of ambition and natural ability.

This ideal stretches back to the anti-authoritarian and egalitarian ethos of Henry Lawson's Australia. And with 91% of us saying that it is a fundamental Australian value, it still defines the way we see the relationship between society and the individual.

But guaranteeing what Gittins calls a 'reasonably equal distribution between households' is not a fair go; it is equality of outcomes.

Rather than ensuring that everyone has the tools to play the game of life to the best of their abilities, equality of outcomes effectively means rigging the game so that everyone ends up with the same results.

Not surprisingly, this ersatz version of Australian egalitarianism is out of step with community attitudes. An overwhelming majority (85%) of Australians think that a person's income 'should depend on how hard they work and how talented they are.'

A focus on equality of outcomes is not just at odds with Australian values; it also distracts us from what we should really be concerned about.

The average number of European sports cars in garages in Vaucluse, Toorak and Peppermint Grove has little bearing on whether Australia lives up to the ideal of a fair go.

As the late, great Helen Hughes stressed, the real test of whether Australia can 'hold its head up as a country that has a fair-go for all' is whether the most disadvantaged Australians can escape poverty and unemployment and take advantage of the abundant economic opportunities enjoyed by most Australians.

Benjamin Herscovitch is a Beijing-based Policy Analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies and author of A Fair Go: Fact or Fiction?.