Meaningful Work Is Indeed a Matter of Distributive Justice

One of the most striking and original features of Erik Malmqvist’s excellent article (Malmqvist 2019) is his claim that participants in Phase 1 clinical trials who make a living out of their participation are treated unjustly, not only in virtue of the risks and potential for exploitation that arise when participating in these trials, but also because in such jobs they are unable to realize the “goods of work.” At the heart of Malmqvist’s argument is the claim that meaningful work is a distributive good; hence, lack of access to it is a matter of distributive justice. This claim is contentious. Some critics argue that while meaningful work is indeed an essential element of the good life, it is not a distributive good. Is meaningful work a genuine political category?