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You are so focused on economic inequality that you ignore the greater picture: there will still be a hierarchy. There will still be humans dominating other huma

You are so focused on economic inequality that you ignore the greater picture: there will still be a hierarchy. There will still be humans dominating other humans and asserting themselves above them. Maybe in the far future humans will create a social technology to live in true equality but in the immediate future this is clearly not happening. As long as there is a hierarchy, you cannot really have equality, sorry. You make humans more economically equal and you create an even worse situation where human hierarchy is based on family name, connections, genetics or just plain violence and social mobility would be even worse than it is now, where it is dictated by income and wealth. Also your definition of meritocracy is contentious. For example you are saying, it is not meritocratic that a boy does not achieve his maximum potential because his parents could not afford to give him the best opportunities. But what if instead of comparing just one generation, we compare two or three? What if we compare their grandparents and their parents? Maybe the grandparents of the poor boy were better off but for whatever reason the wealth did not tickle down in sufficient quantities. Whereas maybe a boy who is richer today had poorer grandparents who worked really hard to make sure their grandchildren had the best opportunities. That looks like meritocracy to me.

jasonclaid 6y ago
It is not the existence of hierarchy that is the problem. It is the type of hierarchy and the effects of that hierarchy. The parent and the study argue that we should give greater resources to those with the least resources in such a way as to broaden access to opportunities. You can argue that is not worth the expense (it costs X to produce Y outcome and redistributing X would lead to negative impact Z. Y + Z results in a net loss to society). But it seems hard to argue that inequality or hierarchy is inevitable so we should not even try to ameliorate the negative effects of that structure or imagine different ones. To me, the “inequality inevitable” mindset seems like a frequent way those who benefited from the existing system rationalize not sacrificing anything to help less fortunate people. I am very sympathetic to arguments that redistribution is not effective, but the debate should be about what is or is not effective. “Inequality inevitable” sidesteps that and asks that we just give up before even trying or imagining different possibilities because we’ve failed in the past. It is hard to not see such arguments as a misguided effort to rationalize one’s self interest.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- curryst 6y ago
  > “Inequality inevitable” sidesteps that and asks that we just give up before even trying or imagining different possibilities because we’ve failed in the past. It is hard to not see such arguments as a misguided effort to rationalize one’s self interest. I don't agree with this. I tend to agree that inequality is inevitable, but where I think I disagree with you is on the definition of equality. If we create an even playing field in the environment, then we've just shifted the goalposts from "How wealthy were your parents?" To "How good are your genetics?". Some people will be born smarter than others, and excel. Some people will be born with learning disabilities and relegated to the bottom of the social hierarchy. Judging based on innate ability also means discriminating against people who innately lack that ability. If you were born dyslexic, you're going to have to work twice as hard to achieve as much. The dyslexia is as innate as IQ advantages. I just don't see a way that hierarchies aren't inherently unequal. You're always judging who has more of a particular thing, so people with less of that thing are worse off. Right now, that's largely money. Is using the genetic lottery a more equal means of doing this? I don't really think so. I would rather focus on reducing the difference in lifestyle between the haves and have nots. If we can't stop inequality, we can at least lessen the effects.
  - 6510 6y ago
    Complaint about people rising to the top who lack the qualities we want to see in leadership suggests [to me] that we [collectively] already have a complete picture of the qualities we admire. Our problem isn't in measuring the qualities but in rewarding the ratios. On a personal level we know how to pick a breeding partner. Collectively selecting the dna cant be all that different. It seems culturally disturbing to reward beauty for example but if beauty > reproduction is good why not beauty > wealth > reproduction? We already have greed > wealth > reproduction, intelligence > wealth > reproduction and inheritance > wealth > reproduction. Those seem just as lame upon close examination. You play chess for your life vs someone with 3 times the intellect? Or monopoly where the opponent starts with all the money and all the streets? The phenotype is a confusing angle. We should do some honest objective conversation about it collectively. Do we want people to be their natural self or do we prefer it if one goes out of his way to become something? Do we genetically optimize for the biggest possible struggle or for the slacking? We seem to look at the flexibility as a positive quality but does it really make a healthy breeding stock? As a human I have to constantly challenge myself mentally and physically or I decay pretty rapidly. I had a sick cat one time that slept on my sofa for 4 years only getting up to eat. Then one day another cat came into the house and she leaped 3 meters off the sofa and ran after it. If I sleep for 4 years I doubt there will be any walking, definitely no running, jumping is out of the question and getting into a fight is unimaginable. We might have really good brains and a good digestive system, the rest of the body could do with some updates.
stuaxo 6y ago
> As long as there is a hierarchy, you cannot really have equality, sorry. You make humans more economically equal and you create an even worse situation where human hierarchy is based on family name, connections, genetics or just plain violence and social mobility would be even worse than it is now, where it is dictated by income and wealth. This sounds like a bit of a stretch. Let's try and make people a bit more equal first.
- enriquec 6y ago
  Why limit Elon Musk - who is arguably ensuring the long-term survivability of our species - for some arbitrary target like absolute equality? Why is a powerful bureaucrat with no money more desirable to you than a rich entrepreneur that had to prove his value before attaining reward? What is wrong with the youth have little-to-no savings and the elderly/about-to-retire having significant wealth and assets?
  - anothernewdude 6y ago
    Because he's as much of a nutcase as you are. > Why is a powerful bureaucrat with no money more desirable to you than a rich entrepreneur that had to prove his value before attaining reward? Because the "value" they have proven is so often criminal and fraudulent in nature - best case scenario it's down to luck. The world is not even close to the meritocracy you think it is.
    - enriquec 6y ago
      How am I a nutcase? For what its worth, I'm successful and happy so I don't take offense. Lions don't worry about sheep.
      - itsoktocry 6y ago
        >I'm successful Yes, as you've told us in a few comments.
        6y ago
jahaja 6y ago
Your so focused on your own take on human nature that you ignore obvious evidence disproving it, namely that Scandinavia isn't a hell hole.
anemoiac 6y ago
Hierarchy is not an all-or-nothing phenomenon. We can reduce levels of inequality without producing the negative outcomes you fear. I’m not sure whether this applies to you (I’m not implying that it does), but I continually find it interesting to hear Americans expressing the fear that acting to reduce inequality will somehow limit social mobility, as if they don’t realize that much of the developed world has greater social mobility than their country (or that many countries also rate higher in measures of social welfare, despite having greater social mobility and lower inequality).
- enriquec 6y ago
  In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility - as well as introduces a middleman (the redistributors that steal/war/lie/oppress), corruption, politics, and extreme inefficiencies. You keep harping on the US, but it is one of - if not the most - upwardly mobile societies in history. One of my favorite anecdotes is how the 'unclassy american tourist' is a product of us being the first society to afford sending our middle/lower-class abroad for fun. And I'm proud of that.
  - jahaja 6y ago
    > In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility Much of Western-Europe show you otherwise, I'm not sure how you could have missed that?
    - enriquec 6y ago
      No it doesn't. It validates exactly what I said. Not sure how you could have missed that.
      - jahaja 6y ago
        I have certainly missed how for example Scandinavian countries fits with this: > In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility - as well as introduces a middleman (the redistributors that steal/war/lie/oppress), corruption, politics, and extreme inefficiencies. Care to explain? Or are you just being childishly contrarian which your last sentence seem to suggest?
jules 6y ago
Economic inequality within a developed nation is one of the least important kinds of inequality. I'd trade one standard deviation of income for one standard deviation of pretty much anything else, such as intelligence or attractiveness. The average person in a developed nation lives better than the kings and emperors of the past in material terms. They had a bigger dwelling, but I'd much rather live in a modern apartment than in a medieval castle. A rich person today can buy a $1200 phone, and a poor person has to make do with a $200 phone. That extra $1000 only marginally improves the quality of the phone. The $200 phone today is still better than the $1200 phone of 10 years ago. The medieval king had no phone, heck, he probably didn't even have running water. The food he ate was worse. We can eat bananas every day, the king perhaps only saw a banana on one of his paintings. The healthcare he had access to was way worse. The transportation he had access to was way worse. The entertainment he had access to was worse.
- jayski 6y ago
  sexual/romantic partners though. if youre living in a shitty apt with a 200 dollar phone, good luck getting interest from potential partners. whereas the king was swimming in booty, and at the end of it all, that's what moves most of us mostly. id argue few ppl really want a lambo for the engineering of it as a machine, they just want to be seen riding in it. 500 years ago a lambo was a fancy horse drawn carriage.
  - sokoloff 6y ago
    I'm married now, but I had what seemed like roughly an average amount of dating difficulty that wasn't significantly changed when I got a better apartment or better phone.
  - jules 6y ago
    You're right, the king probably had more booty. Remember though that the king's wealth is many standard deviations above average, so we have to compare him to somebody who is many standard deviations more attractive than average. In the modern world, one standard deviation of physical attractiveness matters way more for attracting sexual/romantic partners than does one standard deviation of wealth, especially so for genuine attraction.
anothernewdude 6y ago
That's really irrelevant. Inequality is the bad thing. Less of it please. Hierarchy? In so far as it currently exists, who cares?
ModernMech 6y ago
When people say that inequality is a problem in society, they are not saying everyone in society should be equal. They're saying maybe it's not a good state of affairs if 1% of the people own 50% of the wealth.
agumonkey 6y ago
One thing I think about is the quality of domination, if I may say it this way. Someone with a better understanding is a normal authority, it might 'dominate' others in the sense that they have to follow his lead and maybe not feel it's right but in the end it's the best path. On the other hand there are so much bad authorities that percolate through luck, appearances, bullying, networking.. and it will be 1) very clear their ways are detrimental .. sometimes almost absurdly, 2) very difficult for people below to change this.

jasonclaid 6y ago

It is not the existence of hierarchy that is the problem. It is the type of hierarchy and the effects of that hierarchy. The parent and the study argue that we should give greater resources to those with the least resources in such a way as to broaden access to opportunities. You can argue that is not worth the expense (it costs X to produce Y outcome and redistributing X would lead to negative impact Z. Y + Z results in a net loss to society). But it seems hard to argue that inequality or hierarchy is inevitable so we should not even try to ameliorate the negative effects of that structure or imagine different ones. To me, the “inequality inevitable” mindset seems like a frequent way those who benefited from the existing system rationalize not sacrificing anything to help less fortunate people. I am very sympathetic to arguments that redistribution is not effective, but the debate should be about what is or is not effective. “Inequality inevitable” sidesteps that and asks that we just give up before even trying or imagining different possibilities because we’ve failed in the past. It is hard to not see such arguments as a misguided effort to rationalize one’s self interest.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
curryst 6y ago
> “Inequality inevitable” sidesteps that and asks that we just give up before even trying or imagining different possibilities because we’ve failed in the past. It is hard to not see such arguments as a misguided effort to rationalize one’s self interest. I don't agree with this. I tend to agree that inequality is inevitable, but where I think I disagree with you is on the definition of equality. If we create an even playing field in the environment, then we've just shifted the goalposts from "How wealthy were your parents?" To "How good are your genetics?". Some people will be born smarter than others, and excel. Some people will be born with learning disabilities and relegated to the bottom of the social hierarchy. Judging based on innate ability also means discriminating against people who innately lack that ability. If you were born dyslexic, you're going to have to work twice as hard to achieve as much. The dyslexia is as innate as IQ advantages. I just don't see a way that hierarchies aren't inherently unequal. You're always judging who has more of a particular thing, so people with less of that thing are worse off. Right now, that's largely money. Is using the genetic lottery a more equal means of doing this? I don't really think so. I would rather focus on reducing the difference in lifestyle between the haves and have nots. If we can't stop inequality, we can at least lessen the effects.
- 6510 6y ago
  Complaint about people rising to the top who lack the qualities we want to see in leadership suggests [to me] that we [collectively] already have a complete picture of the qualities we admire. Our problem isn't in measuring the qualities but in rewarding the ratios. On a personal level we know how to pick a breeding partner. Collectively selecting the dna cant be all that different. It seems culturally disturbing to reward beauty for example but if beauty > reproduction is good why not beauty > wealth > reproduction? We already have greed > wealth > reproduction, intelligence > wealth > reproduction and inheritance > wealth > reproduction. Those seem just as lame upon close examination. You play chess for your life vs someone with 3 times the intellect? Or monopoly where the opponent starts with all the money and all the streets? The phenotype is a confusing angle. We should do some honest objective conversation about it collectively. Do we want people to be their natural self or do we prefer it if one goes out of his way to become something? Do we genetically optimize for the biggest possible struggle or for the slacking? We seem to look at the flexibility as a positive quality but does it really make a healthy breeding stock? As a human I have to constantly challenge myself mentally and physically or I decay pretty rapidly. I had a sick cat one time that slept on my sofa for 4 years only getting up to eat. Then one day another cat came into the house and she leaped 3 meters off the sofa and ran after it. If I sleep for 4 years I doubt there will be any walking, definitely no running, jumping is out of the question and getting into a fight is unimaginable. We might have really good brains and a good digestive system, the rest of the body could do with some updates.

stuaxo 6y ago

> As long as there is a hierarchy, you cannot really have equality, sorry. You make humans more economically equal and you create an even worse situation where human hierarchy is based on family name, connections, genetics or just plain violence and social mobility would be even worse than it is now, where it is dictated by income and wealth. This sounds like a bit of a stretch. Let's try and make people a bit more equal first.

enriquec 6y ago
Why limit Elon Musk - who is arguably ensuring the long-term survivability of our species - for some arbitrary target like absolute equality? Why is a powerful bureaucrat with no money more desirable to you than a rich entrepreneur that had to prove his value before attaining reward? What is wrong with the youth have little-to-no savings and the elderly/about-to-retire having significant wealth and assets?
- anothernewdude 6y ago
  Because he's as much of a nutcase as you are. > Why is a powerful bureaucrat with no money more desirable to you than a rich entrepreneur that had to prove his value before attaining reward? Because the "value" they have proven is so often criminal and fraudulent in nature - best case scenario it's down to luck. The world is not even close to the meritocracy you think it is.
  - enriquec 6y ago
    How am I a nutcase? For what its worth, I'm successful and happy so I don't take offense. Lions don't worry about sheep.
    - itsoktocry 6y ago
      >I'm successful Yes, as you've told us in a few comments.
      - 6y ago

jahaja 6y ago

Your so focused on your own take on human nature that you ignore obvious evidence disproving it, namely that Scandinavia isn't a hell hole.

anemoiac 6y ago

Hierarchy is not an all-or-nothing phenomenon. We can reduce levels of inequality without producing the negative outcomes you fear. I’m not sure whether this applies to you (I’m not implying that it does), but I continually find it interesting to hear Americans expressing the fear that acting to reduce inequality will somehow limit social mobility, as if they don’t realize that much of the developed world has greater social mobility than their country (or that many countries also rate higher in measures of social welfare, despite having greater social mobility and lower inequality).

enriquec 6y ago
In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility - as well as introduces a middleman (the redistributors that steal/war/lie/oppress), corruption, politics, and extreme inefficiencies. You keep harping on the US, but it is one of - if not the most - upwardly mobile societies in history. One of my favorite anecdotes is how the 'unclassy american tourist' is a product of us being the first society to afford sending our middle/lower-class abroad for fun. And I'm proud of that.
- jahaja 6y ago
  > In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility Much of Western-Europe show you otherwise, I'm not sure how you could have missed that?
  - enriquec 6y ago
    No it doesn't. It validates exactly what I said. Not sure how you could have missed that.
    - jahaja 6y ago
      I have certainly missed how for example Scandinavian countries fits with this: > In every instance I've seen, redistribution does limit mobility - as well as introduces a middleman (the redistributors that steal/war/lie/oppress), corruption, politics, and extreme inefficiencies. Care to explain? Or are you just being childishly contrarian which your last sentence seem to suggest?

jules 6y ago

Economic inequality within a developed nation is one of the least important kinds of inequality. I'd trade one standard deviation of income for one standard deviation of pretty much anything else, such as intelligence or attractiveness. The average person in a developed nation lives better than the kings and emperors of the past in material terms. They had a bigger dwelling, but I'd much rather live in a modern apartment than in a medieval castle. A rich person today can buy a $1200 phone, and a poor person has to make do with a $200 phone. That extra $1000 only marginally improves the quality of the phone. The $200 phone today is still better than the $1200 phone of 10 years ago. The medieval king had no phone, heck, he probably didn't even have running water. The food he ate was worse. We can eat bananas every day, the king perhaps only saw a banana on one of his paintings. The healthcare he had access to was way worse. The transportation he had access to was way worse. The entertainment he had access to was worse.

jayski 6y ago
sexual/romantic partners though. if youre living in a shitty apt with a 200 dollar phone, good luck getting interest from potential partners. whereas the king was swimming in booty, and at the end of it all, that's what moves most of us mostly. id argue few ppl really want a lambo for the engineering of it as a machine, they just want to be seen riding in it. 500 years ago a lambo was a fancy horse drawn carriage.
- sokoloff 6y ago
  I'm married now, but I had what seemed like roughly an average amount of dating difficulty that wasn't significantly changed when I got a better apartment or better phone.
- jules 6y ago
  You're right, the king probably had more booty. Remember though that the king's wealth is many standard deviations above average, so we have to compare him to somebody who is many standard deviations more attractive than average. In the modern world, one standard deviation of physical attractiveness matters way more for attracting sexual/romantic partners than does one standard deviation of wealth, especially so for genuine attraction.

anothernewdude 6y ago

That's really irrelevant. Inequality is the bad thing. Less of it please. Hierarchy? In so far as it currently exists, who cares?

ModernMech 6y ago

When people say that inequality is a problem in society, they are not saying everyone in society should be equal. They're saying maybe it's not a good state of affairs if 1% of the people own 50% of the wealth.

agumonkey 6y ago

One thing I think about is the quality of domination, if I may say it this way. Someone with a better understanding is a normal authority, it might 'dominate' others in the sense that they have to follow his lead and maybe not feel it's right but in the end it's the best path. On the other hand there are so much bad authorities that percolate through luck, appearances, bullying, networking.. and it will be 1) very clear their ways are detrimental .. sometimes almost absurdly, 2) very difficult for people below to change this.