Luck Egalitarianism for Hard Determinists

Luck egalitarians believe that inequalities between people are unjust only to the extent that those inequalities arise as a result of brute bad luck, rather than free choice. Hard determinists believe that free choice is an illusion. This poses a problem for those of us who are both luck egalitarians and hard determinists, since the combination of both theses looks very unpalatable: we seem to be required to compensate every person for every disadvantage. In this article I argue that this outcome can be avoided, without undermining one's commitment to either the luck egalitarian or hard determinist theses. This is because a commitment to implementing de facto outcome egalitarianism is likely to be extremely psychologically demanding, and we are entitled (on the luck egalitarian view) to be compensated for the “misfortune” of our psychological commitments to free will.