People feel obliged to argue that the State does more for the rich than for the poor, as a justification for its taking more from them [through taxation]: though this is in reality not true, for the rich would be far better able to protect themselves, in the absence of law or government, than the poor, and indeed would probably be successful in converting the poor into their slaves. [Utilitarianism, Chapter 5]
This is a curious point Mill makes. If it were true that the rich do not benefit in proportion to their wealth from the existence of the state, one would have to ask how slavery ever came to be abolished? Surely not because the weaker poor could force the rich to do it? For, ex hypothesi, they could not. Was it that some appeal to humanity or compassion was finally successful after so many centuries to penetrate the heart of the wealthy and powerful? Enough to make them concede power to something less amenable to their interests than a plutocratic state? But what force could this be that could prevail on wealth and power? Surely not something so insipid as moral guilt. For that would be to admit that the rich have acted irrationally, i.e., against there own self-interest, in abdicating some of their power? Unless, of course, one confessed some rationality in the concept of guilt. But what then of utility? Since that is what we want here to found moral action upon. We can’t mean there is utility in the distribution of wealth based on guilt? Or perhaps, contrary to Mill, the rich are indeed quite fearful of being the moral (and perhaps physical) targets they would be as exclusive possessors of power, so that in the interest of their security they find it expedient to concede to some degree. To what degree? To what the calculus of utility would dictate. What would determine that? How much pain could be applied to them if they did not concede and continue to concede. What is the limit of concession? When the poor become threatened by their own wealth. (We are assuming, for the sake of the argument, that the real reason the rich yield is not their sheer stupidity and that the real reason the poor have had such patience with the rich is not theirs.)