I'm not sure how you connect the first paragraph with the second.
> American culture doesn't like to think about how much of "success" is down to luck. [...] The idea of trying to make up for some of the luck factor by taking some from those with more and giving it to those with less is almost instinctively repugnant, even if it might lead to higher quality of life for everyone involved.
I don't find charitable giving repugnant. I donate myself, even when there is no tax benefit to be gained. I don't find conservative and prudently managed social safety nets repugnant either (by prudent, I have in mind social safety nets that are by design meant to help people get out of poverty, not become dependent on such a system by creating incentives to remain effectively poor). I also recognize that the common good does require more than just money (and I do recognize a common good, unlike weird, sociopathic hyperindividualists). And in times of crisis, I recognize that a rigid notion of private property is opposed to the common good; private property exists, after all, for the sake of the common good. If I had a warehouse of food during a famine, I would not view people taking amounts of food from that warehouse to allow them to survive as theft.
What I do find repugnant is what seems like the insinuation that my luck somehow means that others are entitled to what I have received through luck[0], and that my claim to such wealth is suspect. If I win the lottery, the notion that there is something unclean about receiving that wealth or bequeathing it to my children, because I was lucky, and others weren't, or else I'm a bad person, is preposterous. It reeks of envy. So, unless I've earned something, others can just take it? I have no right to it? But they have a right to it? Unless I've earned something, I must feel insecure about having it? No, actually. If I have received something through luck, through gift, through merit, and I have done so without criminality, it is mine.
Now, if I did win the lottery, I would certainly give to charity. And if a competent state taxed me in a reasonable way to fund programs that genuine help lift the poor out of poverty, I have no issue in principle. And I would claim, that those who have surplus wealth beyond what is needed to fully support themselves and their families do well to use that surplus to aid the poor (the poor, mind you, not those who can make it on their own). I simply reject the notion that others can or should force me to do so. And when I have the freedom to decide on my own, I have the freedom to allocate money prudently.
> American culture doesn't like to think about how much of "success" is down to luck. [...] The idea of trying to make up for some of the luck factor by taking some from those with more and giving it to those with less is almost instinctively repugnant, even if it might lead to higher quality of life for everyone involved.
I don't find charitable giving repugnant. I donate myself, even when there is no tax benefit to be gained. I don't find conservative and prudently managed social safety nets repugnant either (by prudent, I have in mind social safety nets that are by design meant to help people get out of poverty, not become dependent on such a system by creating incentives to remain effectively poor). I also recognize that the common good does require more than just money (and I do recognize a common good, unlike weird, sociopathic hyperindividualists). And in times of crisis, I recognize that a rigid notion of private property is opposed to the common good; private property exists, after all, for the sake of the common good. If I had a warehouse of food during a famine, I would not view people taking amounts of food from that warehouse to allow them to survive as theft.
What I do find repugnant is what seems like the insinuation that my luck somehow means that others are entitled to what I have received through luck[0], and that my claim to such wealth is suspect. If I win the lottery, the notion that there is something unclean about receiving that wealth or bequeathing it to my children, because I was lucky, and others weren't, or else I'm a bad person, is preposterous. It reeks of envy. So, unless I've earned something, others can just take it? I have no right to it? But they have a right to it? Unless I've earned something, I must feel insecure about having it? No, actually. If I have received something through luck, through gift, through merit, and I have done so without criminality, it is mine.
Now, if I did win the lottery, I would certainly give to charity. And if a competent state taxed me in a reasonable way to fund programs that genuine help lift the poor out of poverty, I have no issue in principle. And I would claim, that those who have surplus wealth beyond what is needed to fully support themselves and their families do well to use that surplus to aid the poor (the poor, mind you, not those who can make it on their own). I simply reject the notion that others can or should force me to do so. And when I have the freedom to decide on my own, I have the freedom to allocate money prudently.
[0] https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1116.htm