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I'm not really convinced a true meritocracy would ever be possible. Sure, you can maybe get closer then we are now, but there will always be nepotism, geographi

I'm not really convinced a true meritocracy would ever be possible. Sure, you can maybe get closer then we are now, but there will always be nepotism, geographical problems, how well someone is parented, etc, even if you somehow equalized wealth. Additionally, why is a meritocracy even desirable? You don't choose your parents, you don't choose your genetics, you don't choose to be born able-bodied or not, so why should you be rewarded for those things over somebody else? Under a meritocracy, a kid born with a 60 IQ and who's physically disabled would have a pretty bad life compared to an able-bodied person born with an IQ of 150. Since neither choose their lot in life, why reward one over the other? The only kind of meritocracy that makes sense to me, is to measure how hard a person works, with the understanding that some people will have to work harder to accomplish as much as others. But again, I don't think that's possible to achieve, and likely never will be.

immawizard 7y ago
Why do you think that grit or predisposition to hard work is less determined by genetics and environment than iq or physical ability? It seems to me that judging anyone’s value by iq, hard work, physical ability, nationality, height, or skin color hold level of inequality. For me, meritocracy is not about the fairness, but rather about efficiency in utilizing resources.
- AstralStorm 7y ago
  The usual problem is of defining merit and testing it. The critical step that is almost always missing is testing the measure - matching it and results. Reality is much more messy than most everything used to decide merit - ultimately even third party judges can be biased or the sample taken might not be representative.
sz4kerto 7y ago
> why should you be rewarded for It's not that you 'should'. It's that other people will more likely give you their money because you're more likely to create value for them.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
> Additionally, why is a meritocracy even desirable? You don't choose your parents, you don't choose your genetics, you don't choose to be born able-bodied or not, so why should you be rewarded for those things over somebody else? Why do you think in terms of rewarding? Isn't the point to have people doing things they're most suited for individually? I guess you could say that meritocracy isn't compatible with free market economy.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  An interesting thing to think about is that having the best person possible for a job is usually incompatible with that person having the job they are best at. In a "meritocracy", which one predominates?
rowanG077 7y ago
It's not a reward. If we give the same to a 60 IQ person as to an 150 IQ person the world would be vastly different. trillions of dollars would be wasted purely on incompetence. I can't even fathom desiring such a world.

immawizard 7y ago

Why do you think that grit or predisposition to hard work is less determined by genetics and environment than iq or physical ability? It seems to me that judging anyone’s value by iq, hard work, physical ability, nationality, height, or skin color hold level of inequality. For me, meritocracy is not about the fairness, but rather about efficiency in utilizing resources.

AstralStorm 7y ago
The usual problem is of defining merit and testing it. The critical step that is almost always missing is testing the measure - matching it and results. Reality is much more messy than most everything used to decide merit - ultimately even third party judges can be biased or the sample taken might not be representative.

sz4kerto 7y ago

> why should you be rewarded for It's not that you 'should'. It's that other people will more likely give you their money because you're more likely to create value for them.

TeMPOraL 7y ago

> Additionally, why is a meritocracy even desirable? You don't choose your parents, you don't choose your genetics, you don't choose to be born able-bodied or not, so why should you be rewarded for those things over somebody else? Why do you think in terms of rewarding? Isn't the point to have people doing things they're most suited for individually? I guess you could say that meritocracy isn't compatible with free market economy.

perl4ever 7y ago
An interesting thing to think about is that having the best person possible for a job is usually incompatible with that person having the job they are best at. In a "meritocracy", which one predominates?

rowanG077 7y ago

It's not a reward. If we give the same to a 60 IQ person as to an 150 IQ person the world would be vastly different. trillions of dollars would be wasted purely on incompetence. I can't even fathom desiring such a world.