5 ms·

As a US academic at a prestigious institution, I find it surprising how few of my close colleagues and collaborators are US born- a very small percentage (maybe

by _yb2s 4y ago

As a US academic at a prestigious institution, I find it surprising how few of my close colleagues and collaborators are US born- a very small percentage (maybe 10-20%?). In some sense it makes sense that if our institutions are best, the globally best researchers would all come here. If it were a true meritocracy, I guess we would expect ~4-5% of US academics to be US born, given that it's our percentage of the world population, but in practice there are huge obstacles for foreigners to come and work here and succeed.

ideamotor 4y ago
We don’t live in a meritocracy even just in our own country. It’s a myth that is used to justify bad behavior.
- Enginerrrd 4y ago
  We also don't live in the antithesis of a meritocracy either. Competency is usually rewarded, and rewards are pretty well correlated with competency. There's plenty of room in the tails one can cite to justifyany opinion on the matter, but on average I think we're far more meritocratic than not.
  - anonporridge 4y ago
    On the scale of nepotism<->meritocracy, the US is probably much closer to meritocracy than most human societies have been. Are there examples of societies who have done meritocracy better, from which we can take ideas to improve our own system?
    - asabjorn 4y ago
      Do you think this remains true with DIE and affirmative action being implemented in all major employers, universities and institutions? It is not fashionable to point to the unmeritocratic treatment of Asians and white males, so I guess I will point out the emperors nakedness. Hiring people of all backgrounds that agree with a forced marxist outcome (diversity), firing people dissenting to Marxist forced outcome or shutting them up (inclusion), and a forced marxist outcome (equity) never lead to meritocracy in other places. Why would it here? Likewise, affirmative action in hiring and research grants favor a less productive woman or a less competent person with the right identity category. Affirmative action categories are from the 60s when the US had a very different demographic, and whom held high status office jobs looked very different.
      - inglor_cz 4y ago
        Your comment is unpopular, judging from the downvotes, but it is still thoughtful and should be debated, not simply downvoted. But you are touching topics that come close to religious faith for some folks, and in an irreverent way.
        asabjorn 4y ago
        Marxism actually is a theology and by proxy wokeness as well, so it is not surprising you get religious zealots. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqj-MKG9SnU&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqj-MKG9SnU&t=1s
        systemvoltage 4y ago
        I wish more people in the tech spoke up against DIE. Corporations are acting as a proxy of Government policies that do not pass the muster of legislative process. It is seems like either 1) Everyone is brainwashed by the woke religion or 2) People know it is malicious but don't have the courage to speak up. Of all the people, I would expect technologists to have a very straight forward, rational and objectivist perspective, but I am realizing that it might not be the case.
        asabjorn 4y ago
        It's the ESG framework that force companies to adopt DIE, kill it and you kill DIE. The marxists are using the large pension funds they manage (blackrock, vanguard, state and federal pension funds etc) to force companies to either seek a high ESG score or see these funds money used as leverage to tank their stock. This is actually illegal, as it's both racketeering and corporations&funds are required to seek profit. Every wondered how oil, coal and weapons companies could have a high ESG score? It's because it's a scam to benefit the cartels controlling the scores. In practice ESG stands for sustainability of the political regime (Environmental), compliance with marxist values and social justice programs (Social) and compliance with the desired principles of the ruling government (Government). DIE is part of the S and G.
      - 4y ago
  - kahrl 4y ago
    Capital is usually rewarded, and rewards are pretty well correlated with capital.
    - xyzzyz 4y ago
      Ah yes, the US universities are well known to hire the wealthiest elites as researchers. Poor foreign grad students are virtually absent from US universities.
      - kahrl 4y ago
        What are you on about? If you read the parent comments, we are talking about country-wide generalisms.
        xyzzyz 4y ago
        Which are clearly false when applied to the actual topic of discussion, so why bring them up?
    - inglor_cz 4y ago
      Depends on the sort of rewards. Saudi Arabia does not seem to be rewarding scientists or inventors and doesn't consequently get any significant scientific results at home, even though the country is obscenely rich.
hderms 4y ago
There are huge obstacles for foreigners to move to the US and work, but higher education is also one of the most straightforward paths to the immigration pipeline (afaik as someone who's never dealt with it themselves). I believe that indicates there are two opposing forces, so the relative proportions being off would likely be expected as we don't know which force is stronger.
wutbrodo 4y ago
I don't think even the most Pollyanna-ish perspective claims that there's a global meritocracy. The smashing success of merit-based immigrants in high-income countries is a pretty undeniable signal that we're nowhere near the point where the marginal legal immigrant is less "meritorious" than the pop avg. I'm personally willing to bite the whole bullet and am an open-borders advocate. But it's a mistake to think that supporters of border restrictions aren't aware that they're explicitly anti-meritocratic.
- dougabug 4y ago
  Immigrant populations aren’t generally uniform random samples of the rest of the world’s population. People with wealth, social capital, high levels of education (which correlates with family background), extraordinary athletic ability, etc. have a generally easier time of immigrating to this (or probably most) countries. Anti-immigration lobbies have tended to caricature and scapegoat low skilled, low income, “undesirables;” while touting their support for (limited) immigration of high skilled, well-heeled immigrants as evidence of that they aren’t simply against foreigners.
  - wutbrodo 4y ago
    Yes, my comment doesn't assume a uniform sample. In fact, it's predicated on there being a substantial filter applied to legal immigrants, such that they are highly successful in their destination country. The performance gap between legal immigrants and natives is sizable, implying that marginal extra immigrants from loosening this filter would still outperform natives. And the marginal extra immigrant outperforming the median native means that claims of a global meritocracy are farcical. ---------- > while touting their support for (limited) immigration of high skilled, well-heeled immigrants as evidence of that they aren’t simply against foreigners. As mentioned, your comment isn't too related to my point. But to follow the tangent: This perspective seems like a consistent and defensible worldview? Wanting a Canada-like system that prioritizes economically-productive immigration is absolutely evidence against a bias against foreigners per se. (I don't share this worldview. I think borders are something close to a crime against humanity. But I'm aware that mine is a radical position. The anti-immigrant boogeyman you describe sounds like a fairly logical extrapolation of a general belief in borders)
i_have_an_idea 4y ago
> few of my close colleagues and collaborators are US born- a very small percentage (maybe 10-20%) [..] If it were a true meritocracy, I guess we would expect ~4-5% of US academics to be US born, given that it's our percentage of the world population It's unrelated to meritocracy. It's just that a significant portion of the world population lives under conditions that are too poor to be able to develop extraordinarily smart people in significant quantities that are able to compete with other smart people born in rich countries. In other words, if you are poor, have poor access to sanitation and nutritious food, you'll be at a severe disadvantage to develop the skills needed to be a top researcher.
bnug 4y ago
I think its because advanced degrees fast track the immigration process, and the better paying jobs are in the US. Those born in the US get a bachelors degree and then a job (probably to pay off the student debt). For a non-US born person with a bachelors degree, it is far more difficult to find a job in the US, so they apply for a MS/PhD program. Then the MS/PhD programs are full of foreign nationals, and naturally the academic R&D jobs pull from that pool made up of mostly non-US persons.

by _yb2s 4y ago

ideamotor 4y ago

We don’t live in a meritocracy even just in our own country. It’s a myth that is used to justify bad behavior.

Enginerrrd 4y ago
We also don't live in the antithesis of a meritocracy either. Competency is usually rewarded, and rewards are pretty well correlated with competency. There's plenty of room in the tails one can cite to justifyany opinion on the matter, but on average I think we're far more meritocratic than not.
- anonporridge 4y ago
  On the scale of nepotism<->meritocracy, the US is probably much closer to meritocracy than most human societies have been. Are there examples of societies who have done meritocracy better, from which we can take ideas to improve our own system?
  - asabjorn 4y ago
    Do you think this remains true with DIE and affirmative action being implemented in all major employers, universities and institutions? It is not fashionable to point to the unmeritocratic treatment of Asians and white males, so I guess I will point out the emperors nakedness. Hiring people of all backgrounds that agree with a forced marxist outcome (diversity), firing people dissenting to Marxist forced outcome or shutting them up (inclusion), and a forced marxist outcome (equity) never lead to meritocracy in other places. Why would it here? Likewise, affirmative action in hiring and research grants favor a less productive woman or a less competent person with the right identity category. Affirmative action categories are from the 60s when the US had a very different demographic, and whom held high status office jobs looked very different.
    - inglor_cz 4y ago
      Your comment is unpopular, judging from the downvotes, but it is still thoughtful and should be debated, not simply downvoted. But you are touching topics that come close to religious faith for some folks, and in an irreverent way.
      - asabjorn 4y ago
        Marxism actually is a theology and by proxy wokeness as well, so it is not surprising you get religious zealots. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqj-MKG9SnU&t=1s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqj-MKG9SnU&t=1s
        systemvoltage 4y ago
        I wish more people in the tech spoke up against DIE. Corporations are acting as a proxy of Government policies that do not pass the muster of legislative process. It is seems like either 1) Everyone is brainwashed by the woke religion or 2) People know it is malicious but don't have the courage to speak up. Of all the people, I would expect technologists to have a very straight forward, rational and objectivist perspective, but I am realizing that it might not be the case.
        asabjorn 4y ago
        It's the ESG framework that force companies to adopt DIE, kill it and you kill DIE. The marxists are using the large pension funds they manage (blackrock, vanguard, state and federal pension funds etc) to force companies to either seek a high ESG score or see these funds money used as leverage to tank their stock. This is actually illegal, as it's both racketeering and corporations&funds are required to seek profit. Every wondered how oil, coal and weapons companies could have a high ESG score? It's because it's a scam to benefit the cartels controlling the scores. In practice ESG stands for sustainability of the political regime (Environmental), compliance with marxist values and social justice programs (Social) and compliance with the desired principles of the ruling government (Government). DIE is part of the S and G.
    - 4y ago
- kahrl 4y ago
  Capital is usually rewarded, and rewards are pretty well correlated with capital.
  - xyzzyz 4y ago
    Ah yes, the US universities are well known to hire the wealthiest elites as researchers. Poor foreign grad students are virtually absent from US universities.
    - kahrl 4y ago
      What are you on about? If you read the parent comments, we are talking about country-wide generalisms.
      - xyzzyz 4y ago
        Which are clearly false when applied to the actual topic of discussion, so why bring them up?
  - inglor_cz 4y ago
    Depends on the sort of rewards. Saudi Arabia does not seem to be rewarding scientists or inventors and doesn't consequently get any significant scientific results at home, even though the country is obscenely rich.

hderms 4y ago

There are huge obstacles for foreigners to move to the US and work, but higher education is also one of the most straightforward paths to the immigration pipeline (afaik as someone who's never dealt with it themselves). I believe that indicates there are two opposing forces, so the relative proportions being off would likely be expected as we don't know which force is stronger.

wutbrodo 4y ago

I don't think even the most Pollyanna-ish perspective claims that there's a global meritocracy. The smashing success of merit-based immigrants in high-income countries is a pretty undeniable signal that we're nowhere near the point where the marginal legal immigrant is less "meritorious" than the pop avg. I'm personally willing to bite the whole bullet and am an open-borders advocate. But it's a mistake to think that supporters of border restrictions aren't aware that they're explicitly anti-meritocratic.

dougabug 4y ago
Immigrant populations aren’t generally uniform random samples of the rest of the world’s population. People with wealth, social capital, high levels of education (which correlates with family background), extraordinary athletic ability, etc. have a generally easier time of immigrating to this (or probably most) countries. Anti-immigration lobbies have tended to caricature and scapegoat low skilled, low income, “undesirables;” while touting their support for (limited) immigration of high skilled, well-heeled immigrants as evidence of that they aren’t simply against foreigners.
- wutbrodo 4y ago
  Yes, my comment doesn't assume a uniform sample. In fact, it's predicated on there being a substantial filter applied to legal immigrants, such that they are highly successful in their destination country. The performance gap between legal immigrants and natives is sizable, implying that marginal extra immigrants from loosening this filter would still outperform natives. And the marginal extra immigrant outperforming the median native means that claims of a global meritocracy are farcical. ---------- > while touting their support for (limited) immigration of high skilled, well-heeled immigrants as evidence of that they aren’t simply against foreigners. As mentioned, your comment isn't too related to my point. But to follow the tangent: This perspective seems like a consistent and defensible worldview? Wanting a Canada-like system that prioritizes economically-productive immigration is absolutely evidence against a bias against foreigners per se. (I don't share this worldview. I think borders are something close to a crime against humanity. But I'm aware that mine is a radical position. The anti-immigrant boogeyman you describe sounds like a fairly logical extrapolation of a general belief in borders)

i_have_an_idea 4y ago

> few of my close colleagues and collaborators are US born- a very small percentage (maybe 10-20%) [..] If it were a true meritocracy, I guess we would expect ~4-5% of US academics to be US born, given that it's our percentage of the world population It's unrelated to meritocracy. It's just that a significant portion of the world population lives under conditions that are too poor to be able to develop extraordinarily smart people in significant quantities that are able to compete with other smart people born in rich countries. In other words, if you are poor, have poor access to sanitation and nutritious food, you'll be at a severe disadvantage to develop the skills needed to be a top researcher.

bnug 4y ago

I think its because advanced degrees fast track the immigration process, and the better paying jobs are in the US. Those born in the US get a bachelors degree and then a job (probably to pay off the student debt). For a non-US born person with a bachelors degree, it is far more difficult to find a job in the US, so they apply for a MS/PhD program. Then the MS/PhD programs are full of foreign nationals, and naturally the academic R&D jobs pull from that pool made up of mostly non-US persons.