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Let's be careful about what we mean by "rich" here. Just being in a top 1% kind of level of wealth isn't enough, you need to be able to make 7+ figure donation

Let's be careful about what we mean by "rich" here. Just being in a top 1% kind of level of wealth isn't enough, you need to be able to make 7+ figure donations.

bilbo0s 7y ago
Well, just going by the article, they defined it as 500 grand a year. Not sure how they got that number, (?), but that's the number they gave. I'm just pointing out that the percentage of whites who are not athletes, and whose parents make less than 500 grand is pretty small. And the percentage of blacks matching that profile is even smaller. And if you really want to see some depressing numbers, factor out the females. That is, count up the number of white males who are not athletes whose parents make less than 500 grand. Or for a real laugh, count up the number of black males who are not athletes whose parents make less than 500 grand. This is just the ugly reality of how our society is currently structured. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that in this society, these sorts of things have a lot to do with money. More to do with money than race even, which is saying something.
- aetherson 7y ago
  There's two different things: Rich enough to make the Dean's List, and then their comment about how rich legacies and athletes are. Legacies and athletes are, per the article, 43.2% and 20% likely (respectively) to have parents who make more than $500k/year. But a "mere" $500k/year is not going to get you enough money to donate enough to get your kid on the dean's list. That's going to take donations of more than $1M. Quite possibly more than $5M, or at least a teaser donation of $1M and some plausible belief from Harvard that you have the means to make more donations than that. This is why there was that scandal with the fake athletes -- because just paying the $150k or so to get your kid a fake record as a polo player or whatever is very cheap compared to the amount of money you need to donate to a top-tier college before they'll give your kid significant admissions preference. For the most part, dean's list donations are out of reach of all but the ultra-rich, maybe the 0.1% or so.

Let's be careful about what we mean by "rich" here. Just being in a top 1% kind of level of wealth isn't enough, you need to be able to make 7+ figure donations.

bilbo0s 7y ago

Well, just going by the article, they defined it as 500 grand a year. Not sure how they got that number, (?), but that's the number they gave. I'm just pointing out that the percentage of whites who are not athletes, and whose parents make less than 500 grand is pretty small. And the percentage of blacks matching that profile is even smaller. And if you really want to see some depressing numbers, factor out the females. That is, count up the number of white males who are not athletes whose parents make less than 500 grand. Or for a real laugh, count up the number of black males who are not athletes whose parents make less than 500 grand. This is just the ugly reality of how our society is currently structured. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that in this society, these sorts of things have a lot to do with money. More to do with money than race even, which is saying something.

aetherson 7y ago
There's two different things: Rich enough to make the Dean's List, and then their comment about how rich legacies and athletes are. Legacies and athletes are, per the article, 43.2% and 20% likely (respectively) to have parents who make more than $500k/year. But a "mere" $500k/year is not going to get you enough money to donate enough to get your kid on the dean's list. That's going to take donations of more than $1M. Quite possibly more than $5M, or at least a teaser donation of $1M and some plausible belief from Harvard that you have the means to make more donations than that. This is why there was that scandal with the fake athletes -- because just paying the $150k or so to get your kid a fake record as a polo player or whatever is very cheap compared to the amount of money you need to donate to a top-tier college before they'll give your kid significant admissions preference. For the most part, dean's list donations are out of reach of all but the ultra-rich, maybe the 0.1% or so.