5 ms·

This article does a horrible job of explaining Turchin's ideas. It's not too many "brainy" people that are the problem. It's that if upward mobility becomes lim

by rhyn00 5y ago

This article does a horrible job of explaining Turchin's ideas. It's not too many "brainy" people that are the problem. It's that if upward mobility becomes limited to those that have advanced degrees, and if there are an oversupply of people with advanced degrees, you will now have (at least) 3 groups of people: non-advanced-educated-but-not-good-enough, educated-but-not-good-enough, and elites. The non-advanced-educated feel marginalized because it will be ridiculously hard for them to get the education, and as things get more expensive their livelihood will go down relative to the elites. The advanced-educated-but-not-good-enough will feel marginalized because they spent their time and money and got nothing in return, and now have debt and degraded livelihood compared to the elites. When enough people feel marginalized AND something happens that weakens the state's power/influence, political instability will occur. It compounds in US/Europe with regards to education, given that these two groups are politically opposite of each other, and advanced education is becoming a barrier of entry to upward mobility. Turchin's 2016 book Ages of discord explains these ideas in detail.

b9a2cab5 5y ago
It's what happens when you have "advanced" degrees that are not actually useful in large numbers to society. We only need so many sociologists and critical race studies professors and political scientists. These jobs also happen to generally be supported off of societal productivity (i.e. taxes and charities) instead of growing the pie which means their supply is naturally limited. Notice that even for STEM jobs which are strongly constrained by available capital, like structural engineering or petroleum engineering, the pay is substantially higher than the useless jobs and the competition is less. You don't have to go to an Ivy League to get paid $$$ in engineering.
- pyuser583 5y ago
  They get jobs outside their field. In 1950s and 60s the US seriously overestimated the number of physicists they would need. Lots of physicists ended up working in business.
  - lixtra 5y ago
    > Lots of physicists ended up working in business. But usually still in roles that benefited from their studies.
    - Apocryphon 5y ago
      Studying complex financial instruments? https://youtu.be/Elyfo1DIlzs https://youtu.be/Elyfo1DIlzs
      - username90 5y ago
        Most of a physics degree is applied maths. If they use their math skills the degree wasn't a waste.
        native_samples 5y ago
        Technically, parts of the degree were wasted (everything to do with actual physics) and the maths education was just a side effect that could have been given more efficiently with a maths degree (or even some other kind of education).
    - pyuser583 5y ago
      Possibly … I know quite a few of these (now retired) ex-physicists. Most got jobs that only expected a Bachelors, not an advanced degree at all. But I’m sure there’s selection bias here.
    - acatnamedjoe 5y ago
      And arguably lots of non-technical roles benefit from social science / humanities studies. If you want to lead a team, or eventually a large organisation, there are worse things you could do than spend 3 years learning about people.
      - coldtea 5y ago
        >And arguably lots of non-technical roles benefit from social science / humanities studies. If by "benefit" you mean "are filled with busywork and the latest cultural biases and performative ceremonies", then yes :-)
- pacman2 5y ago
  Ivy League to get paid $$$ in engineering.? Really? I got nothing with my top notch STEM PhD. Got hungry, homeless an sick. But as mentioned by a friend. A STEM PhD must never be unemployed. There are always opportunities in the world. Be it in China or with Narcos in South America. There are opportunities. Never forget that! Nearly killed me that I forgot. There will always be one to pay you if you can deliver.
  - pbak 5y ago
    Walter, is that you ?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- indrax 5y ago
  These forms of knowledge do grow the pie, they just haven't formed a monetization/product loop. The scarcity of jobs to fund their work (which we need vastly more of) is a market failure. -An unemployed STEM
- coldtea 5y ago
  >We only need so many sociologists and critical race studies professors and political scientists. Yeah, and the number is 0.
nautilius 5y ago
You have another group, the advanced-educated-and-good-enough-but-not-connected-enough-so-they’re-stuck-behind -someone-who-is-less-qualified. I could imagine they’re the group that feels worst.
- justanotherguy0 5y ago
  Yeah I dislike this framing. Elite overproduction isn't about "good enough," it's about alignment. Trump was never accepted into the NYC elite social circle. They had money, elite education, and influence. But they weren't in-group. Bannon also is a good study. And there's always a couple of weirdos at prep school who don't quite fit in.
  - nautilius 5y ago
    That’s - not at all what I meant.
    - justanotherguy0 5y ago
      Turchin, the guy who came up with this, applies it specifically to trump. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/17/were-on-the-verge-of-breakdown-a-data-scientists-take-on-trump-and-biden https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/17/were-on-the-...
      - nautilius 5y ago
        Turchin is, of course, free to think whatever he wants (I haven't studied his ideas). However, I can't see how my statement applies in any way to either Bannon or Trump. Trump is unsuspicious of having advanced education and qualifications, but instead was born into a millionaire family which allowed him to pursue whatever he wanted. If anything, he would be the person blocking a position from someone qualified but not well connected. He even ended up being president, in case someone forgot. Bannon apparently served in the Navy, got a Harvard MBA, worked at Goldman Sachs. His wiki page starts "Stephen Kevin Bannon (born November 27, 1953) is an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker, who served as the White House's chief strategist in the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump". I'd say by most standards one would say he reached quite a number of things he set his mind to that most people don't. Again, hardly an example of someone who failed in his career because he was blocked by someone less qualified.
salt-thrower 5y ago
Any time I see a headline is from the Economist I go straight to the comments for the inevitable rebuttal of their oversimplifications or outright bias. Appreciate the book recommendation; just ordered it.
sideshowb 5y ago
Thanks, good to hear there's more substance behind this than the article implies. The article lost any remaining credibility with me when the best example of radicalism they could find was Corbyn. As other comments here have said, that shows a strong lack of willingness to think critically about the current system - and a willingness to clutch at straws such as a theory about "too many educated people" to avoid that critical thinking.
- pbak 5y ago
  Maybe the journalist was precisely part of the overproduction...
specialist 5y ago
David Graeber (and others) make an adjacent criticism: Lots of people would like to choose "caring" work. Teaching, healthcare, policy stuff, knowledge stuff, etc. Something meaningful and rewarding. With rising inequity, only people who can afford higher education, who don't have to work to eat, can choose these "caring" career paths. Some fraction of the resentment towards the "liberal elite" is from being denied access to these "caring" roles. Made worse by the obliviousness of people like me not even realizing there's a problem. -- I regard both Turchin and Graeber's theories as complimentary. I also hope that leftists like me will dig into these social phenomenon. Until we understand better, I'm content with very cheap higher ed, with some professions being subsidized. For example, I'm happy to pay people to become doctors (specialists). Society needs more. Students shouldn't be penalized, having to wait +12 years before starting families (or whatever).
- mmarq 5y ago
  > Lots of people would like to choose "caring" work. Teaching, healthcare, policy stuff, knowledge stuff, etc. Something meaningful and rewarding. > With rising inequity, only people who can afford higher education, who don't have to work to eat, can choose these "caring" career paths. > Some fraction of the resentment towards the "liberal elite" is from being denied access to these "caring" roles. Made worse by the obliviousness of people like me not even realizing there's a problem. Is there really a phenomenon of people angry to the point of causing social instability because they have to work in a bank rather than teaching calculus in high school?
  - dwhit 5y ago
    Pol Pot did want to teach history, after all.
coldtea 5y ago
>The advanced-educated-but-not-good-enough It's not like those "advanced-educated" that are left out are hating on the top elite of the advanced ("the great") that are "good". For starters, because those are too few, and they don't compete directly, plus they can see their merits. So, usually it's "advanced-educated-and-perfectly-good" vs "advanced-educated-but-lucky-or-with-connections-and/or-family-wealth" where the discontent lies.

by rhyn00 5y ago

b9a2cab5 5y ago

It's what happens when you have "advanced" degrees that are not actually useful in large numbers to society. We only need so many sociologists and critical race studies professors and political scientists. These jobs also happen to generally be supported off of societal productivity (i.e. taxes and charities) instead of growing the pie which means their supply is naturally limited. Notice that even for STEM jobs which are strongly constrained by available capital, like structural engineering or petroleum engineering, the pay is substantially higher than the useless jobs and the competition is less. You don't have to go to an Ivy League to get paid $$$ in engineering.

pyuser583 5y ago
They get jobs outside their field. In 1950s and 60s the US seriously overestimated the number of physicists they would need. Lots of physicists ended up working in business.
- lixtra 5y ago
  > Lots of physicists ended up working in business. But usually still in roles that benefited from their studies.
  - Apocryphon 5y ago
    Studying complex financial instruments? https://youtu.be/Elyfo1DIlzs https://youtu.be/Elyfo1DIlzs
    - username90 5y ago
      Most of a physics degree is applied maths. If they use their math skills the degree wasn't a waste.
      - native_samples 5y ago
        Technically, parts of the degree were wasted (everything to do with actual physics) and the maths education was just a side effect that could have been given more efficiently with a maths degree (or even some other kind of education).
  - pyuser583 5y ago
    Possibly … I know quite a few of these (now retired) ex-physicists. Most got jobs that only expected a Bachelors, not an advanced degree at all. But I’m sure there’s selection bias here.
  - acatnamedjoe 5y ago
    And arguably lots of non-technical roles benefit from social science / humanities studies. If you want to lead a team, or eventually a large organisation, there are worse things you could do than spend 3 years learning about people.
    - coldtea 5y ago
      >And arguably lots of non-technical roles benefit from social science / humanities studies. If by "benefit" you mean "are filled with busywork and the latest cultural biases and performative ceremonies", then yes :-)
pacman2 5y ago
Ivy League to get paid $$$ in engineering.? Really? I got nothing with my top notch STEM PhD. Got hungry, homeless an sick. But as mentioned by a friend. A STEM PhD must never be unemployed. There are always opportunities in the world. Be it in China or with Narcos in South America. There are opportunities. Never forget that! Nearly killed me that I forgot. There will always be one to pay you if you can deliver.
- pbak 5y ago
  Walter, is that you ?
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
indrax 5y ago
These forms of knowledge do grow the pie, they just haven't formed a monetization/product loop. The scarcity of jobs to fund their work (which we need vastly more of) is a market failure. -An unemployed STEM
coldtea 5y ago
>We only need so many sociologists and critical race studies professors and political scientists. Yeah, and the number is 0.

nautilius 5y ago

You have another group, the advanced-educated-and-good-enough-but-not-connected-enough-so-they’re-stuck-behind -someone-who-is-less-qualified. I could imagine they’re the group that feels worst.

justanotherguy0 5y ago
Yeah I dislike this framing. Elite overproduction isn't about "good enough," it's about alignment. Trump was never accepted into the NYC elite social circle. They had money, elite education, and influence. But they weren't in-group. Bannon also is a good study. And there's always a couple of weirdos at prep school who don't quite fit in.
- nautilius 5y ago
  That’s - not at all what I meant.
  - justanotherguy0 5y ago
    Turchin, the guy who came up with this, applies it specifically to trump. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/17/were-on-the-verge-of-breakdown-a-data-scientists-take-on-trump-and-biden https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/17/were-on-the-...
    - nautilius 5y ago
      Turchin is, of course, free to think whatever he wants (I haven't studied his ideas). However, I can't see how my statement applies in any way to either Bannon or Trump. Trump is unsuspicious of having advanced education and qualifications, but instead was born into a millionaire family which allowed him to pursue whatever he wanted. If anything, he would be the person blocking a position from someone qualified but not well connected. He even ended up being president, in case someone forgot. Bannon apparently served in the Navy, got a Harvard MBA, worked at Goldman Sachs. His wiki page starts "Stephen Kevin Bannon (born November 27, 1953) is an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker, who served as the White House's chief strategist in the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump". I'd say by most standards one would say he reached quite a number of things he set his mind to that most people don't. Again, hardly an example of someone who failed in his career because he was blocked by someone less qualified.

salt-thrower 5y ago

Any time I see a headline is from the Economist I go straight to the comments for the inevitable rebuttal of their oversimplifications or outright bias. Appreciate the book recommendation; just ordered it.

sideshowb 5y ago

Thanks, good to hear there's more substance behind this than the article implies. The article lost any remaining credibility with me when the best example of radicalism they could find was Corbyn. As other comments here have said, that shows a strong lack of willingness to think critically about the current system - and a willingness to clutch at straws such as a theory about "too many educated people" to avoid that critical thinking.

pbak 5y ago
Maybe the journalist was precisely part of the overproduction...

specialist 5y ago

David Graeber (and others) make an adjacent criticism: Lots of people would like to choose "caring" work. Teaching, healthcare, policy stuff, knowledge stuff, etc. Something meaningful and rewarding. With rising inequity, only people who can afford higher education, who don't have to work to eat, can choose these "caring" career paths. Some fraction of the resentment towards the "liberal elite" is from being denied access to these "caring" roles. Made worse by the obliviousness of people like me not even realizing there's a problem. -- I regard both Turchin and Graeber's theories as complimentary. I also hope that leftists like me will dig into these social phenomenon. Until we understand better, I'm content with very cheap higher ed, with some professions being subsidized. For example, I'm happy to pay people to become doctors (specialists). Society needs more. Students shouldn't be penalized, having to wait +12 years before starting families (or whatever).

mmarq 5y ago
> Lots of people would like to choose "caring" work. Teaching, healthcare, policy stuff, knowledge stuff, etc. Something meaningful and rewarding. > With rising inequity, only people who can afford higher education, who don't have to work to eat, can choose these "caring" career paths. > Some fraction of the resentment towards the "liberal elite" is from being denied access to these "caring" roles. Made worse by the obliviousness of people like me not even realizing there's a problem. Is there really a phenomenon of people angry to the point of causing social instability because they have to work in a bank rather than teaching calculus in high school?
- dwhit 5y ago
  Pol Pot did want to teach history, after all.

coldtea 5y ago

>The advanced-educated-but-not-good-enough It's not like those "advanced-educated" that are left out are hating on the top elite of the advanced ("the great") that are "good". For starters, because those are too few, and they don't compete directly, plus they can see their merits. So, usually it's "advanced-educated-and-perfectly-good" vs "advanced-educated-but-lucky-or-with-connections-and/or-family-wealth" where the discontent lies.