The Conclusion emphasizes the book’s primary argument, that its proposed system of means-based adjustments to the tax compliance rules would more effectively deter tax avoidance and evasion by the rich than would reforms focused solely on increasing the IRS’s funding or on rules targeting specific potentially abusive activities. It notes that the book has provided four practical applications of this approach – as adjustments to tax penalties, penalty defenses, the statute of limitations, and information reporting – but that these examples are just the beginning. The book concludes that its analysis and new approach to tax administration should be relevant to legislators and other tax policymakers, scholars of both tax law and progressivity, and federal and state tax administrators.

The Introduction sets the stage by describing the intense focus on abusive tax avoidance and tax evasion by the rich among political figures, legal scholars, and the general public. The Introduction also describes the stakes for the tax system in addressing high-end tax noncompliance. It then provides an overview of two conventional approaches to the problem of high-end tax noncompliance: increasing IRS funding and “activity-based rules” targeting specific strategies that enable tax avoidance and evasion. The Introduction describes the book’s argument that both of these responses are incomplete solutions. It then describes the overlooked role that tax compliance rules – which govern critical aspects of tax administration and enforcement but that currently apply to all taxpayers without regard to their income or wealth – play in enabling tax avoidance and evasion by the rich. The Introduction provides a summary of the core argument and contribution of the book: that policymakers should introduce a system of means-based adjustments to the tax compliance rules for high-end taxpayers.

Our approach to thriving encompasses not just the growth of individuals but also of collectives. Therefore, when we talk about how people thrive in this chapter and throughout the book, we refer to people in the singular and in the plural. Instead of creating a dichotomy between individual and community, we refer to people as comprising the unique lives of each one of us, the relational bonds that tie us together, and the communities and settings we are a part of. Our definition of thriving acknowledges the primordial role of situational fairness, the phenomenology of worthiness, and the myriad forms of wellness. In other words, thriving consists of context + experiences + outcomes. We submit that the key context impacting our ability to thrive as individuals and collectives is one of fairness. Similarly, we argue that key experiences have to do with mattering and a sense of worth, both of which have to do with feeling valued and opportunities to add value. Finally, we make the point that wellness exists in multiple forms and for people to thrive they should nurture all of them.

I argue that in some circumstances the capacity for voluntary agreement making can be an adequate realization of the All-Affected principle. The basic idea is that one can, with this capacity, attempt to advance one’s interests by entering into voluntary agreements with others. The All-Affected Principle can be satisfied if persons are able to enter into agreements with those whose actions affect them or with those who can advance their interests. Persons should have an equal say or a say proportionate to their legitimate interests and this can be realized in voluntary agreement making, or so I shall argue. I draw an analogy between democratic decision making traditionally conceived and voluntary agreement making. This helps us see how we can define appropriate procedural norms for the evaluation of processes of voluntary agreement making in both market and international contexts. I argue that fair voluntary agreement in markets and international decision-making is a realization of the same principle as fair collective decision-making in democracy only one is for decentralized decision making and the other is for centralized decision making.

In this chapter, I argue that international criminal law institutions must satisfy two criteria to justify their claim to legitimate authority. First, they need to ensure fair trials. But while fairness is a necessary condition for the legitimate authority of the international exercise of criminal justice, it is not a sufficient condition. Institutions need to answer the subordination complaint: When some rule, others are subordinated to their rule – and the point of legitimate institutions is to address how this fact can be reconciled with the equal status of persons. An adequate way to respond to the subordination complaint is to vest institutions with democratic procedures that ensure equal control over the coercive rule of an institution. In the final part of chapter five, I highlight two strategies that enable states and individuals to exercise equal control over the court. The first strategy involves a legislative assembly that deliberates and decides on questions of criminal justice and institutional design. The second strategy seeks to make judicial lawmaking, where it is inevitable, more accountable to the public.

At the core of any legal decision is an assumption that the decision will be “fair,” yet this is an elusive term. A close study of cases involving criminal defendants with mental disabilities shows that many (perhaps most) of the decisions involving this cohort are not “fair” in the contexts of due process and justice. If legal decisions reflect principles such as procedural justice, restorative justice, and therapeutic jurisprudence, the chances of such fairness will be significantly enhanced. This chapter explains why this goal of fairness, in the context of these cases, can never be met absent a consideration of the virulence of sanism and pretextuality, along with the misuse of heuristics and false “ordinary common sense.” These factors enable much of society to ignore gray areas of human behavior, and predispose fact-finders to endorse beliefs in accord with their prior experiences.

Equality and equal treatment are the principal purpose of WTO law. However, that purpose is accomplished in varying conditions, which make it difficult to regularly attain the consistency and coherence that an egalitarian and obligatory conception of the law assumes. Consequently, this chapter proceeds to demonstrate how WTO law is focused secondarily on fairness and corrective justice and how this focus begets a subordinate emphasis in law on rights, which in turn gives rise to a contractual structure that is retrospectively oriented and reasoned inductively. It also demonstrates how various features of WTO law like the non-violation cause of action and implementation are consistent with such a rights-based ethos.

Fairness concerns are ubiquitous in the realm of redistributive politics. This chapter builds on research across the social sciences to provide a parsimonious approach to the study of fairness “in action.” In Western democracies, reasoning about the fairness of redistributive social policies implies two types of fairness evaluation: (1) how fair is it for some to make (a lot) more money than others in the marketplace, and (2) how fair is it for some to receive more in benefits than they pay in taxes? Each question calls to mind a different norm of fairness: the proportionality norm, which prescribes that individual rewards be proportional to effort and talent, and the reciprocity norm, which prescribes that cooperative behavior be rewarded more than uncooperative behavior. Agreement with these two norms is quasi-universal. Where people differ is in their beliefs about the prevalence of norm-violating outcomes and behaviors. Accounting for the nature and empirical manifestations of fairness reasoning provides a new understanding of the demand side of redistributive politics in times of rising equality.

There is no getting around the fact that we live in a social and cultural environment and there is no denying the fact that the laws of our society deeply affect its character. From the fact that law impacts the environment of those who are subject to it, it does not follow that legal officials should attempt to improve its ethical character. This chapter presents a presumptive case for why legal officials are not only permitted but also have a duty to do so. Ethical environmentalism is the political project that aims to satisfy that duty. After clarifying the notion of an ethical environment, and relating it to the aspirational ideal of the common good of a society, the chapter argues that ethical environmentalism is supported by considerations of fairness. The relation between fair treatment and neutral treatment is then explored and clarified. Ethical environmentalism presupposes a public/private distinction. The shared public world, as contrasted with the private thoughts and activities of individuals, defines its scope. With that in mind, the chapter distinguishes two forms of legal moralism, character-centered and status-centered, and discusses how each form relates to the project of ethical environmentalism.

In this essay, we review the Technology and Measurement around the Globe chapters with an eye toward integration and synthesis. We primarily focus on implications for testing, and then make connections to the broader world of nontest assessment. We identify themes of privacy, fairness, workplace applications, and emerging technologies, and offer a research agenda for future investigations that seek to understand culture, technology, and measurement.