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It's certainly a lagging indicator for 1/N of the people at those schools. For the other 1-(1/N), it's more like the "last" of the leading indicators – i.e. th

by gen220 3y ago

It's certainly a lagging indicator for 1/N of the people at those schools. For the other 1-(1/N), it's more like the "last" of the leading indicators – i.e. their last shot at a significant step change in career outcomes before beginning a career. The ability to get a great technical education is more a function of who your parents are and how involved they want to be in your education than anything else, me thinks. "Top N schools" at any stage from pre-K to college is a lagging indicator of that. What do you think the forest is?

alephnerd 3y ago
By lagging indicator I mean traditionally less selective public schools have become extremely selective now. When I was in elementary school, I assumed I'd get into Cal because everyone did in the 90s and 2000s. By the late 2000s and early 2010s, it's selectivity dropped to the 10-20% range and is dropping further. This is the same at other flagships as well (eg. UCLA, UVA, Mich, etc). With this drop in acceptance rate, programs also shot up in US News Rankings. Everyone took UChicago's playbook and copied it. > What do you think the forest is? Inequality at the K-12 level. In my age group (20-35) we're already socially stratified largely because we attended the same 200-300 elite HSes which were feeders to the handful of top colleges nationally. Most Americans won't be able to attend such high schools as they are expensive af - either directly via Tuition if they're private, or indirectly by having houses starting at the million mark for public schools. The elite of society has become much more diverse racially, but this is very shallow as most Americans 1. Don't attend college 2. Don't attend college track high school programs 3. Don't attend high schools with enough ECs to be competitive 4. Don't attend high schools which provide the level of guidance and counseling needed to apply and get selected at one of those top colleges. This kind of social stratification already exists in the UK, Canada, Germany, and Australia, and is starting to occur in the US again.
- gen220 3y ago
  I see and agree that education and support at the earliest levels of education are heavily correlated with inequality in elite outcomes. However, I think this has always been the case in American history, no? There were brief periods where this wasn't true for the richest people in the US, but the majority of the top 1% has always been bred for the top 1%. If you accept that it's more or less constant and think that the magnitude of inequality is the bigger issue, this isn't necessarily a bad thing: as long as the top 1% continue to allocate capital effectively, and don't get too greedy (i.e. leave enough wealth for the rest of society to lead fulfilling lives / don't exacerbate the inequality gap). For what it's worth, I think the primary issue today is that it's becoming increasingly difficult to live a "dignified life" (i.e. free from debt or peonage), unless you fall on the right side of the inequality distribution. That quality-of-life-burden is less severe of an issue in the other countries you mention. Unfortunately, expanding higher-quality education does not solve this problem.

by gen220 3y ago

alephnerd 3y ago

By lagging indicator I mean traditionally less selective public schools have become extremely selective now. When I was in elementary school, I assumed I'd get into Cal because everyone did in the 90s and 2000s. By the late 2000s and early 2010s, it's selectivity dropped to the 10-20% range and is dropping further. This is the same at other flagships as well (eg. UCLA, UVA, Mich, etc). With this drop in acceptance rate, programs also shot up in US News Rankings. Everyone took UChicago's playbook and copied it. > What do you think the forest is? Inequality at the K-12 level. In my age group (20-35) we're already socially stratified largely because we attended the same 200-300 elite HSes which were feeders to the handful of top colleges nationally. Most Americans won't be able to attend such high schools as they are expensive af - either directly via Tuition if they're private, or indirectly by having houses starting at the million mark for public schools. The elite of society has become much more diverse racially, but this is very shallow as most Americans 1. Don't attend college 2. Don't attend college track high school programs 3. Don't attend high schools with enough ECs to be competitive 4. Don't attend high schools which provide the level of guidance and counseling needed to apply and get selected at one of those top colleges. This kind of social stratification already exists in the UK, Canada, Germany, and Australia, and is starting to occur in the US again.

gen220 3y ago
I see and agree that education and support at the earliest levels of education are heavily correlated with inequality in elite outcomes. However, I think this has always been the case in American history, no? There were brief periods where this wasn't true for the richest people in the US, but the majority of the top 1% has always been bred for the top 1%. If you accept that it's more or less constant and think that the magnitude of inequality is the bigger issue, this isn't necessarily a bad thing: as long as the top 1% continue to allocate capital effectively, and don't get too greedy (i.e. leave enough wealth for the rest of society to lead fulfilling lives / don't exacerbate the inequality gap). For what it's worth, I think the primary issue today is that it's becoming increasingly difficult to live a "dignified life" (i.e. free from debt or peonage), unless you fall on the right side of the inequality distribution. That quality-of-life-burden is less severe of an issue in the other countries you mention. Unfortunately, expanding higher-quality education does not solve this problem.