4 ms·

Merit seems to be highly subjective given that the people in current US administration are all hired based on merit.

by croes 2y ago

op00to 2y ago
The merit they evaluate for is loyalty to the leader, not academic merit, or some other measure.
- rayiner 2y ago
  And zeal for carrying out the elected official’s agenda. Which is the whole point of political appointments.
  - mlinhares 2y ago
    That didn't work very well for the folks that tried that defense in the Nuremberg trials. If the agenda is to commit crimes and destroy the constitution I would have expected people to be a bit more patriotic.
- DFHippie 2y ago
  Yes, but this isn't what they'll say if you ask them. Hiring based on the worst prejudice or nepotism is still merit based in this sense. Meritocracy is supposed to be about varieties of merit which you aren't ashamed to admit are relevant.
stego-tech 2y ago
...damn, that's a legitimately sick burn that's also a prime example of why "Meritocracies" are a bad thing on their face. "Whose merit? What is merit? Why is X merit but not Y? How come person A's merit is worth less than person B's?" Your response was beautifully eloquent.
- achenet 2y ago
  counter-example: Most systems that work with standardized tests, while they can systematically fail to capture certain types of talent, are fairly objective - "if you're in the top 10% on this test, then we take you". The format and subject matter of the test is known in advance, people are free to prepare for it in whatever way they want. Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', with examples dating back to the Chinese civil service examinations during the Sui and Tang dynasty (from around 593 AD). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination
  - Timon3 2y ago
    > Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', [...] It's important not to forget Goodhart's law in this context: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure". Unless the tested skill is wholly and directly applicable to the position you're testing for, the results will still be unfairly skewed towards those with more resources - they can afford more time to study for this specific test, and more importantly they have the resources to buy specialized learning material as well as tutoring. Of course that's not to say that merit doesn't factor into the results at all, but it does mean that even examples of 'how to do meritocracy right' show that merit is never the only thing that matters.
    - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
      This is presented as an argument against objective metrics, but a) the alternative is subjective metrics, which is even worse, b) "disparate impact" is just another metric subject to Goodhart's law, and c) resources aren't the only thing that determines test scores. If you're poor but determined, you can't afford a high cost test prep course, but you can go to the library. The rich kid has their private tutor come to their house and then saves time that allowed them to be chauffeured to tennis lessons. The poor kid has to take the bus to the library and spend twice as long with the study books and then doesn't get any tennis lessons, but it's possible for someone to do that if they actually care about it. Whereas, how is a low-income white kid supposed to overcome a race quota where every slot for their race was already filled by nepotism?
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
I'd just say that I find it very frustrating that the argument for "one side" is how insane "the other side" is, because then that pretends that reasonable solutions (and not what I would call "compromises") don't exist, because you're only looking at the extremes. Yes, I think it's nuts to replace "DEI hires" with DUI hires and pretend that is "merit based", and I think the US has become a pretty full-blown kakistocracy (my new favorite word) right now. But while I agree with the purported goals of DEI, I often saw it go "off the rails" in practice, and lead to a cottage industry of pseudoscience-based "DEI consultants". I'll show my hand: when it comes to DEI, I absolutely get behind the "I" part of it - everyone should feel welcome and included at work. When it comes to the "D" part, while I support outreach to cast as wide a net as possible when it comes to things like hiring, too often I saw this devolve into soft quotas and semi-performative hand wringing when some job distribution didn't exactly match the wider population distribution. The "E" part I think was frankly insane and just "equality of outcome" over "equality of opportunity" with window dressing - and yes, I've heard how backers framed the equity part, but in practice I always saw it looking for excuses as to why people who got ahead were privileged and why people who didn't were marginalized, regardless of the individual's actual circumstances.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- wredcoll 2y ago
  > but in practice I always saw it looking for excuses as to why people who got ahead were privileged and why people who didn't were marginalized, regardless of the individual's actual circumstances. I feel like it's easy to notice the examples where it stood out. A survey of all the actual results might (or might not!) change your opinion. That being said, it's easy to say stuff like "everyone should be treated equally!", it's slightly harder to actually mean it, and it's even harder to do something about it. We're certainly not legislators debating a bill before us, we're on social media arguing, but it'd be nice if people complaining made some effort to think of a solution.
  - slowmovintarget 2y ago

Merit seems to be highly subjective given that the people in current US administration are all hired based on merit.

by croes 2y ago

Merit seems to be highly subjective given that the people in current US administration are all hired based on merit.

op00to 2y ago

The merit they evaluate for is loyalty to the leader, not academic merit, or some other measure.

rayiner 2y ago
And zeal for carrying out the elected official’s agenda. Which is the whole point of political appointments.
- mlinhares 2y ago
  That didn't work very well for the folks that tried that defense in the Nuremberg trials. If the agenda is to commit crimes and destroy the constitution I would have expected people to be a bit more patriotic.
DFHippie 2y ago
Yes, but this isn't what they'll say if you ask them. Hiring based on the worst prejudice or nepotism is still merit based in this sense. Meritocracy is supposed to be about varieties of merit which you aren't ashamed to admit are relevant.

stego-tech 2y ago

...damn, that's a legitimately sick burn that's also a prime example of why "Meritocracies" are a bad thing on their face. "Whose merit? What is merit? Why is X merit but not Y? How come person A's merit is worth less than person B's?" Your response was beautifully eloquent.

achenet 2y ago
counter-example: Most systems that work with standardized tests, while they can systematically fail to capture certain types of talent, are fairly objective - "if you're in the top 10% on this test, then we take you". The format and subject matter of the test is known in advance, people are free to prepare for it in whatever way they want. Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', with examples dating back to the Chinese civil service examinations during the Sui and Tang dynasty (from around 593 AD). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination
- Timon3 2y ago
  > Of course, being good at passing tests doesn't mean one will be good at other things, in much the same way that one can be good at Leetcode problems but not good at building and maintaining large scale software systems in a large corporate environment. Still, it remains a 'credible' example of 'how to do meritocracy right', [...] It's important not to forget Goodhart's law in this context: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure". Unless the tested skill is wholly and directly applicable to the position you're testing for, the results will still be unfairly skewed towards those with more resources - they can afford more time to study for this specific test, and more importantly they have the resources to buy specialized learning material as well as tutoring. Of course that's not to say that merit doesn't factor into the results at all, but it does mean that even examples of 'how to do meritocracy right' show that merit is never the only thing that matters.
  - AnthonyMouse 2y ago
    This is presented as an argument against objective metrics, but a) the alternative is subjective metrics, which is even worse, b) "disparate impact" is just another metric subject to Goodhart's law, and c) resources aren't the only thing that determines test scores. If you're poor but determined, you can't afford a high cost test prep course, but you can go to the library. The rich kid has their private tutor come to their house and then saves time that allowed them to be chauffeured to tennis lessons. The poor kid has to take the bus to the library and spend twice as long with the study books and then doesn't get any tennis lessons, but it's possible for someone to do that if they actually care about it. Whereas, how is a low-income white kid supposed to overcome a race quota where every slot for their race was already filled by nepotism?

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

hn_throwaway_99 2y ago

I'd just say that I find it very frustrating that the argument for "one side" is how insane "the other side" is, because then that pretends that reasonable solutions (and not what I would call "compromises") don't exist, because you're only looking at the extremes. Yes, I think it's nuts to replace "DEI hires" with DUI hires and pretend that is "merit based", and I think the US has become a pretty full-blown kakistocracy (my new favorite word) right now. But while I agree with the purported goals of DEI, I often saw it go "off the rails" in practice, and lead to a cottage industry of pseudoscience-based "DEI consultants". I'll show my hand: when it comes to DEI, I absolutely get behind the "I" part of it - everyone should feel welcome and included at work. When it comes to the "D" part, while I support outreach to cast as wide a net as possible when it comes to things like hiring, too often I saw this devolve into soft quotas and semi-performative hand wringing when some job distribution didn't exactly match the wider population distribution. The "E" part I think was frankly insane and just "equality of outcome" over "equality of opportunity" with window dressing - and yes, I've heard how backers framed the equity part, but in practice I always saw it looking for excuses as to why people who got ahead were privileged and why people who didn't were marginalized, regardless of the individual's actual circumstances.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
wredcoll 2y ago
> but in practice I always saw it looking for excuses as to why people who got ahead were privileged and why people who didn't were marginalized, regardless of the individual's actual circumstances. I feel like it's easy to notice the examples where it stood out. A survey of all the actual results might (or might not!) change your opinion. That being said, it's easy to say stuff like "everyone should be treated equally!", it's slightly harder to actually mean it, and it's even harder to do something about it. We're certainly not legislators debating a bill before us, we're on social media arguing, but it'd be nice if people complaining made some effort to think of a solution.
- slowmovintarget 2y ago