> People usually don't like that solution, especially when considering welfare programs, but it is fair to give no one assistance in the sense that everyone was treated equally/fairly.

If you're saying all the different ways you could spend that money, then you're saying non-intervention for the wealthier people how made a bad financial choice, and yes-intervention for other ways in which the money could be spent, which again, is a decision on where to give limited resources.

I'm not saying I agree or don't agree with whether it would be more helpful to give it to those who have college debt or those in the US who are without a home or frankly those here in Kenya (where I am now) who if don't have money, might starve to death.

Moreover that each decision can be judged.

> Now its a totally different question whether its fair that some people are in this position today. The answer is almost certainly no, but that doesn't have a direct impact on whether an intervention today is fair or not.

If we approach it from this side, I agree. Non-intervention, or not giving any limited resources to anyone, is the most fair approach and then we can evaluate whether it's fair the position in which those people are. Yet I don't know how realistic this is, to withhold all resources from everyone.

I personally don't like the word "fair" very much because of how context-dependent it is. It's often used in "that's unfair" by a person who feels attacked or aggrieved in some way. It seems to have such a subjective quality to it, and yet can be claimed to be objective.

It actually reminds me of an essay I wrote years ago called "The Subjective Adjective" [0] (wow, I wrote it 10 years ago!) The premise is that we take how we subjectively feel and then transform it into an objective statement on reality, overlooking how subjective it really is.

Anyways, I agree some of these conversations seem to devolve into definitional debates that may not get at the real point.

I think I also replied to a different comment thinking it was you—identity and conversational continuation, an aspect of context so often hidden/lacking on HN.

In general, I agree with you that a policy could be equal/fair as in giving everyone an equal amount of X, and that the unfair part is where people are in life. I actually liked the idea of charging a flat tax across the US and then having people voluntarily pay the tax for those who couldn't pay it, because I agree, I would see the tax as fair but the wealth inequality as unfair and one way to rectify that is for people to voluntarily rebalance the wealth. But yeah, I'm sure tons of people would see that as unfair.

I really don't know lol.

[0]: https://www.jimkleiber.com/the-subjective-adjective/

Have you lived in a country where the citizens believe that the government is overall apathetic to their situations? It often doesn't create a utopia, but rather a lot of cynicism and reliance on family support networks. I'm an American currently in East Africa and I imagine many if not most people here would say the government doesn't care about them and does very little for them. So what ends up happening is that since there is little government/social welfare programs, people rely on family welfare. And well, if you don't have a rich family, your life can be really really really hard, if you even survive.

Your family doesn't have money? No food. No service at the emergency room. Heck, even no water.

I think there's a balance and that people who want more apathy and inaction may not realize what it's like when that's actually the case.

I wish more people still held this view. When in doubt a government should avoid acting for fear of unintended consequences.