The conclusions of "The Veil of Ignorance" are a just standard by which public policy must be made

The Resolution: The conclusions drawn from the Veil of Ignorance thought experiment created by John Rawls are, by the definitions provided, a fair standard by which to judge and structure future public policy of the United States of America. The Argument: The conclusions drawn from "VoI" are as follows- -Each person will be given the most extensive basic liberties without intruding on the liberties of others -There will be equal opportunity for everyone to climb the economic and/or social ladder and that any social or economic inequalities that are allowed must be arranged so that they might improve the access to Primary Goods for the Least Advantaged. -The Primary Goods are outlined in round 1 The lynchpin of this argument is the term "just", "based on or behaving according to what is morally right and fair". So, we are essentially concerned with the state of fairness or a lack thereof in our society. I will define fair as "a state in which unmerited advantages are limited or of little negative consequence". Chess is fair because both players are given the same tools and no player is given an advantage by the game, even if one player is more skillful. It becomes unfair if one player must play without a queen because the box didn"t come with two. Let us then talk about the root of all unfairness in our society: chance birth. I will address this phenomenon with the hypothetical citizens Jack and Jill. Let us assume that if Jack and Jill were born into the same social-economic state, went to the same schools, had pleasant lives and aspired to have the same job, they would both be equally able to do so and it would be near impossible for an employer to choose between them. Now let us assume that they are both still equally capable but they are born in radically different situations. Jill drops out of school in spite of her perfect grades at 17 to get a job and support her mother and younger brother. Her family is in debt from mortgage payments and medical bills and Jill realizes that she cannot support her family even by working full time but can"t go back to school as her family will surely fail financially without her income. Her mother becomes sick and stops working, and Jill knows they can"t afford treatment. She applies for a loan and is denied, presumably because she is black and a woman (. http://www.nclc.org...), and seeps into depression. She finds solace in recreational marijuana use and relies on that to cope with her life and eventually becomes a manager at the retail store she works at. She is caught smoking, is arrested and is sentenced to 5 years in prison for drug use, the same average time as a white man would serve for a violent crime, and presumably arrested because she is African American (. http://www.naacp.org...). She gets out only to find that her younger brother has resorted to a life of crime and her mother has died. She is unable to find a job due to her criminal record and lack of degree and spends the rest of her short life on welfare, all of her potential success made impossible due to the circumstances of her birth. She dies alone at 29 after being mugged and shot. Jack on the other hand has it good. Born to an affluent white family, he goes to the best private schools and has tutors. A straight A student, he goes to college and has it paid for by his parents, parties and uses marijuana recreationally but is let go by the one officer who catches him and his friends because his parents are well known in the local community. He gets through college, finds a job and is paid more than his female coworkers for that same job (. http://www.iwpr.org...), which is an added advantage as they are all struggling to pay off student debt while he has a trust fund set up by his parents. He moves up the company with ease, marries, lives a generally affluent life and dies at 83 surrounded by family. Now, obviously I wanted to, and did, paint a particular picture with these stories, but that does not mean that lives like this do not take place, and take place often. And it is also worth noting that any part of the story can change. I can make Jill not drop out of school, never use substances, go to college and still fall into destitution because she is crippled by student debt and finds it much harder to find a job than her white male counterpart (. http://www.nber.org...). There are countless capable people, in the US and abroad, who are subjected to lives like that of Jill because of the chance occurrence of their birth and there are countless people who are subjected to lives like that of Jack for the same reason. I know many capable people who live good lives largely due to their birth. Conversely, I know many capable and respectable people who have had the opposite life purely due to bad luck. The objective of this argument is to suggest that a just, therefor fair, society is not one where chance can easily destroy a citizen"s life. Obviously there will always be chance and there will always be natural advantages/disadvantages in the lives of citizens, and it is not the objective of this argument to suggest that one"s good luck must be punished. What I am suggesting is that while good luck can be the road to success, bad luck cannot be an allowable road to poverty or destitution. I suggest no bar above which a capable citizen cannot ascend, only a bar below which a capable citizen cannot descend. That bar, that set of policies which will defend a society"s citizens against phenomena beyond their control, is the assimilation of the conclusions of Rawl"s Veil of Ignorance into our society. So what exactly are the problems in society which make the circumstances of one"s birth of paramount importance? To name a few- Any citizens can become financially ruined by: -medical costs (getting injured or sick is a chance occurrence) -cost of education (going to school is a decision but your parent"s ability to pay is a chance occurrence as you do not choose your parents) Groups of citizens (race/gender/sexual orientation ext. . all chance occurrences) are unfairly targeted or discriminated against in: -criminal cases (mostly minorities, particularly African Americans) -financial support like loans (minorities and women) -the workplace (minorities and women) Now, I believe I have demonstrated that the lives of many, if not all, people are shaped in part by chance. This shows that capable people"s lives can be destroyed by no fault of their own or by other unfair means and suggests that if it is the goal of a society to be just and therefore fair, it must provide the means for a citizen to show the fruits of their capacity even in the cases of extremely unfortunate birth circumstances or any unfortunate circumstance which is not the fault of the victim. The political translation is that the government must provide safety nets to guard against unfortunate chance phenomena which can apply to anyone. Even a white male, born rich, can fall into destitution through no fault of his own. There are endless ways that a life can be ruined faultlessly. Natural disasters are a great example that applies to thousands of people across every demographic every year. So, I have identified a problem and I have proposed a fair solution. It is not the goal of this debate to provide the "how", of achieving Rawl"s conclusions is the best way, nor that these conclusions are in fact the best solution to solve the problem outlined here. The goal of my opponent, as laid out in the first round, is to convince the voters that adherence to these conclusions would make society unfair or more unfair. I will also allow him to argue that society (the united states society) is already fair and therefor no solution is even necessary.