8 ms·

Such as "the right parents", which in many cases is a pretty efficient gate keeper.

carierx1 6y ago
Or just better genetics.
laurent92 6y ago
The social elevator can take 2 generations. And that is ok. There is a lot of things to learn. It gives hope to one’s dad. Sadly inheritance is looked down upon, and people would like every citizen to be born with the same information, and this information being delivered by public education. Sadly, parents teach much better than teachers when it is about the little things that make a life successful. There will never be a way around this. Transmission will never be good between people who don’t care for each others, such as civil servants. Therefore we should acknowledge that, yes, some parts of success will be taught by parents, and tearing children from parents will only lose information instead of elevating everyone. We should elevate parents and teach them so that they, too, can get successful children, and make sure all kids get two parents, and as many grandparents as possible (who are very, very important for psychological stability and growth), and make sure parents can be confident in teaching their children, i.e. not criticizing them for teaching them methods to succeed which have succeeded for a millenium, like, I don’t know, marrying which is the single best predictor of success. Sure, we can re-engineer humans without parent inheritance, tear them off and give them to childcare centers, but we already know the sad results. I’ve once asked my Arab employee why only (foreign) Arabs applied to our job (in France) and had the skills, he very acutely noted that their parents don’t allow them to fail, whereas French-born developers were more lazy. The result is very visible here: The only decent application we have are from North Africa. « The right parents » is not about wealth or social exclusion. It is that some parents decide to be crap parents and destroy a millenium of wisdom at their generation by not transmitting all the accumulated knowledge, generally due to some ideological dream (« my ancestors were all wrong! THIS is how you do it! I shall be free to roam! ») But the failed child is free to start again, marry, work a lot, study success, and he can give his child an excellent life, and his grandson can be CEO of a large company. Society can’t offset crap parents. Society already does a good job at making social move possible; 86% billionaires of our generation didn’t have billionaire parents. Also, don’t believe I’m not sorry for the victims, but let’s pass the word and teach again the good tips that have worked for millenia, instead of telling everyone they can survive with a mother-and-two-step-uncles, a flat, a brother in jail and a pink dress. It is not ok to say that. We should rather tell them it will be hard and we can help them progress if they choose to live a clean life starting from now.
- jackhack 6y ago
  thank you for this insightful view of the importance of family and parental guidance. it adds a lot to the conversation.
- ck425 6y ago
  My impression, and indeed my personal issue with inheritance, is financial inheritance. I have far less issues with other forms of inheritance. Sure I'm occasionally jealous of the opportunities or skills others learnt from a young age but overall I'm just glad there are more talented, thoughtful, considerate people out there. The only part that ticks me off is arrogant people who claim to have gotten far only on their own backs and who refuse to acknowledge any good fortune (what you could call non-financial inheritance) on their part. Admittedly that pisses me off more because I used to do it a lot myself.
  - dfxm12 6y ago
    My impression, and indeed my personal issue with inheritance, is financial inheritance. According to this study[0], at least 50% of wealth persistence is accounted for by direct transfers from parents, i.e. financial inheritance, while earnings and education are only able to explain 25%. 0 - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ecoj.12535 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ecoj.12535
    - ryandrake 6y ago
      Education is often a financial inheritance in disguise. If dad pays for your K-12 private schooling and entire Harvard education, how is that practically different than a direct cash transfer?
      - fierarul 6y ago
        Would you want to live in a society where a parent would definitely not pay for better education? What kind of people would those be!?

Or just better genetics.

The social elevator can take 2 generations. And that is ok. There is a lot of things to learn. It gives hope to one’s dad. Sadly inheritance is looked down upon, and people would like every citizen to be born with the same information, and this information being delivered by public education. Sadly, parents teach much better than teachers when it is about the little things that make a life successful. There will never be a way around this. Transmission will never be good between people who don’t care for each others, such as civil servants. Therefore we should acknowledge that, yes, some parts of success will be taught by parents, and tearing children from parents will only lose information instead of elevating everyone. We should elevate parents and teach them so that they, too, can get successful children, and make sure all kids get two parents, and as many grandparents as possible (who are very, very important for psychological stability and growth), and make sure parents can be confident in teaching their children, i.e. not criticizing them for teaching them methods to succeed which have succeeded for a millenium, like, I don’t know, marrying which is the single best predictor of success. Sure, we can re-engineer humans without parent inheritance, tear them off and give them to childcare centers, but we already know the sad results. I’ve once asked my Arab employee why only (foreign) Arabs applied to our job (in France) and had the skills, he very acutely noted that their parents don’t allow them to fail, whereas French-born developers were more lazy. The result is very visible here: The only decent application we have are from North Africa. « The right parents » is not about wealth or social exclusion. It is that some parents decide to be crap parents and destroy a millenium of wisdom at their generation by not transmitting all the accumulated knowledge, generally due to some ideological dream (« my ancestors were all wrong! THIS is how you do it! I shall be free to roam! ») But the failed child is free to start again, marry, work a lot, study success, and he can give his child an excellent life, and his grandson can be CEO of a large company. Society can’t offset crap parents. Society already does a good job at making social move possible; 86% billionaires of our generation didn’t have billionaire parents. Also, don’t believe I’m not sorry for the victims, but let’s pass the word and teach again the good tips that have worked for millenia, instead of telling everyone they can survive with a mother-and-two-step-uncles, a flat, a brother in jail and a pink dress. It is not ok to say that. We should rather tell them it will be hard and we can help them progress if they choose to live a clean life starting from now.

jackhack 6y ago
thank you for this insightful view of the importance of family and parental guidance. it adds a lot to the conversation.
ck425 6y ago
My impression, and indeed my personal issue with inheritance, is financial inheritance. I have far less issues with other forms of inheritance. Sure I'm occasionally jealous of the opportunities or skills others learnt from a young age but overall I'm just glad there are more talented, thoughtful, considerate people out there. The only part that ticks me off is arrogant people who claim to have gotten far only on their own backs and who refuse to acknowledge any good fortune (what you could call non-financial inheritance) on their part. Admittedly that pisses me off more because I used to do it a lot myself.
- dfxm12 6y ago
  My impression, and indeed my personal issue with inheritance, is financial inheritance. According to this study[0], at least 50% of wealth persistence is accounted for by direct transfers from parents, i.e. financial inheritance, while earnings and education are only able to explain 25%. 0 - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ecoj.12535 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ecoj.12535
  - ryandrake 6y ago
    Education is often a financial inheritance in disguise. If dad pays for your K-12 private schooling and entire Harvard education, how is that practically different than a direct cash transfer?
    - fierarul 6y ago
      Would you want to live in a society where a parent would definitely not pay for better education? What kind of people would those be!?