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It's important to note that people who say they'd like to see a more equitable distribution of wealth may not necessarily be saying they'd like to see more redi
by hugh3 16y ago
It's important to note that people who say they'd like to see a more equitable distribution of wealth may not necessarily be saying they'd like to see more redistribution of the wealth created by the top people, they may be saying that they'd like to see the bottom people become more productive.
Suppose a freak disease killed off everybody with an IQ below 120. Obviously society would take some time to adjust to the new reality, but once the adjustment occurred, what do you suppose the weath distribution would look like? Significantly more equitable, I assume.
We don't have a bad distribution of wealth, we have a bad distribution of talent.
- borism 16y agois there any evidence that top 1% have higher IQ than bottom 99%?
- hugh3 16y agoIs there any lack of evidence that wealth is correlated with intelligence? It seems as obvious as "height is correlated with gender" to me, but feel free to go read The Bell Curve or something.
- grandalf 16y agoDon't overlook the impact of personal preferences/choices in the mix. Some very smart people do things like found startups or become teachers or lit PhDs, marry a rich person, or decide to avoid the rat race.
- hugh3 16y agoOf course. Broad, society-wide correlations don't say much about specific cases. You won't find many of these PhDs in the bottom 10%, though (except in cases of mental illness). Smart people are smart enough to figure out how to avoid desperate poverty, and some of them are also smart enough to figure out that making $400K a year for Bain won't make them happy.