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If you get significantly better grades than your peers, you can land yourself a high income job, no matter how poor you grow up. Many US immigrants take advanta
by mjfl 8y ago
If you get significantly better grades than your peers, you can land yourself a high income job, no matter how poor you grow up. Many US immigrants take advantage of this, and have achieved single generation jumps from lower class to upper middle class. I have known several, personally. Isn’t this the definition of meritocracy?
- throwaway77384 8y agoI would say that it is a facet of meritocracy. After all, status alone doesn't necessarily represent the reward one might expect for one's achievements. For certain people, class, or remuneration probably matters much less than recognition, for example. If said recognition goes to whomever shouts the loudest or makes sure to 'appear' best (even though anyone with expert knowledge would immediately know this person isn't the best), then you are no longer living in a meritocracy. I should note that I find the whole idea of a meritocracy rather flawed, as it would somehow require to perfectly equate all of your actions, every single day, in every walk of life with some kind of reward or easy-to-query metric. That's just not feasible. And even if it was, who would want another type of China-style sesame credit on steroids?