Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point • Hacker News Board

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#71

Post by jariel » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 6:51 PM UTC

_qulr wrote: post #67

jariel wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take the most broad and crude measure, educational outcomes, as some, albeit imperfect input to the system and you'll see very unambiguously and consistently that kids with better grades will do better in life, in most measures. Next time you are at the office, look to your left, look to your right: you will notice conscientious people, probably educated, probably reasonably hard working, team work oriented, and prob…

> Then hop on the bus and have conversations with the 'average person'. You fill find somewhat less conscientious, less interested, less curious, less intelligent people. Wow, this is jaw-dropping stereotype. I used to ride the bus, and unsurprisingly, my level of intelligence was completely unaffected by the mode of transportation I happened to be using at the time. Also, public transportation is more environmentall…

As a non-car owner, I ride the bus almost daily.

The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense, at least in terms of wage earning potential.

Ironically it would be someone without exposure to the 'bus world' who would have some utopian view that somehow all these bus riders are 'the same as professionals'.

My hunch is that it is white, upper middle class professionals without exposure who have this naive perspective as only entitled people can afford to.

It's pretty obvious riding the bus daily, that on average, that is not the case.

What is 'jaw dropping' is the lack of self awareness int many people seem to have difficulty accepting these simple facts, even if they don't 'feel' very nice.

'The bus' (esp. not the subway) is the domain of the urban working class - full stop.

"is more environmentally friendly" - this is irrelevant to the argument - the question is, why imbue the debate with side-show moralizing?

Those on ballpark equal footing who entered your high-school all had various opportunities in life, those who consistently put their best feet forward (usually measured by better grades but often not), were more consistently likely to have better opportunities. Not always, but usually.

Those who entered the work force and did 'a terrible job' were, by and large - not advanced. Those who did 'a good job' - mostly had more opportunity.

Obviously it's not always the case, but it usually is.

The people going to Medical School, mostly, are really really impressive folks.

The people stocking shelves, while they could be as great as pre-meds, and whatever talents they have are probably under utilized ... are nevertheless not in pre-med generally for good reason: the system is crudely meritocratic.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#72

Post by username90 » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 6:52 PM UTC

sanxiyn wrote: post #60

cs702 wrote: post #31

Many people, including me, feel differently about two different kinds of unfairness: * We are OK with the unfairness that stems from "winning the genetic lottery," which confers an unfair advantage regardless of the socioeconomic background of parents . Most of us want a society in which the most able, talented, hard-working, persistent among us can put those qualities to work for their most productive uses. * We are…

I am not okay with unfairness stemming from genetic lottery. Sure, I agree those with genetic lottery should be able to put those qualities to most productive uses, it would be waste otherwise. On the other hand, they probably shouldn't capture the most of produced value, since it is mostly unearned. There is a reason lottery earning is heavily taxed.

Money is a measure of power in society, it lets you choose how society spends some of its resources. Giving more power to competent people so they can direct societies efforts to better use is a good thing, that is why capitalism works. If you take that away we are left with communism.

Note I don't say that we should let people be poor etc. I am from Sweden, I think Sweden works great in this regard. Sweden has produced plenty of billionaires, and in terms of successful startups per capita Sweden is among the best in the world. Yet Sweden still takes care of its poor etc, people getting rich isn't a problem, it is necessary for capitalism to work.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#73

Post by username90 » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 6:57 PM UTC

Bakary wrote: post #28

sanxiyn wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure what is ironic about the last paragraph. The point is that growth and distributioin are orthogonal concerns.

The author's argument is that their conception of meritocracy is laudable because it grows the pie, and growing the pie is the most important thing if we are to avoid fighting for scraps. They're not saying that growth and distribution are orthogonal, just that the former leads to a better latter and ought to be prioritized. This is ironic in the sense that much scrap fighting is the result of growth being captured a…

Do you consider that countries like Sweden are still mostly meritocratic? Growing the pie is almost always a good thing, it gives you more resources to tax so you can benefit the poor. The problems you see in USA aren't that they focus too much on merit but that they focus too little on redistribution afterwards.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#74

Post by _qulr » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:02 PM UTC

username90 wrote: post #70

_qulr wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then hop on the bus and have conversations with the 'average person'. You fill find somewhat less conscientious, less interested, less curious, less intelligent people. Wow, this is jaw-dropping stereotype. I used to ride the bus, and unsurprisingly, my level of intelligence was completely unaffected by the mode of transportation I happened to be using at the time. Also, public transportation is more environmentall…

He didn't say that bus riders are less intelligent. If you talk to a random person they are pretty dumb, and you find random people at busses. There isn't more to it than that. Personally I experienced the average person when I did my military duty. Most people were forced to attend so you got a good slice of what society looks like. And yes, the average person there wasn't that bright, the discussions I heard there…

> If you talk to a random person they are pretty dumb, and you find random people at busses.

No, that's not how randomness works. If you talk to sufficiently many random people, you will likely get a wide distribution of people.

Besides, talking to strangers is not a good measure, because people are often guarded around strangers. Especially on the bus, I thought people who tried to talk to me out of the blue were a bit strange and to be avoided.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#75

Post by spacekitcat » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

username90 wrote: post #69

spacekitcat wrote: post #37

As a woman in tech, I feel that it isn't actually a meritocracy. I think people have a habit of assuming men did the real work in a project, so they get a disproportionate share of the credit. People also have a habit of pushing women towards front end work, making the assumption that men are more 'technical' than women. It can be difficult to watch men get all of the credit for your blood, sweat and tears. It's espe…

Meritocracy is a good thing and we should never stop striving for it. The problem isn't that some strive for meritocracy, the problem is when people argue that they are meritocratic when they aren't. It is pretty easy to argue that there is plenty of merit in hiring women, like adding diversity to teams has benefits and so on, I don't see why you need to argue against the concept itself. > The concept of a meritocrac…

I think proponents of meritocracy are naive.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#76

Post by tyu2 » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:08 PM UTC

jariel wrote: post #71

_qulr wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then hop on the bus and have conversations with the 'average person'. You fill find somewhat less conscientious, less interested, less curious, less intelligent people. Wow, this is jaw-dropping stereotype. I used to ride the bus, and unsurprisingly, my level of intelligence was completely unaffected by the mode of transportation I happened to be using at the time. Also, public transportation is more environmentall…

As a non-car owner, I ride the bus almost daily. The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense, at least in terms of wage earning potential. Ironically it would be someone without exposure to the 'bus world' who would have some utopian view that somehow all these bus riders are 'the same as professionals'. My hunch is that it is white,…

You should read some Nassim Taleb or something, because what you are saying is too nonsensical, like there is no awareness of chances in your arguments whatsoever, as if this dystopian concept of merit is somehow actually real.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#77

Post by tyu2 » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:16 PM UTC

_qulr wrote: post #74

username90 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn't say that bus riders are less intelligent. If you talk to a random person they are pretty dumb, and you find random people at busses. There isn't more to it than that. Personally I experienced the average person when I did my military duty. Most people were forced to attend so you got a good slice of what society looks like. And yes, the average person there wasn't that bright, the discussions I heard there…

> If you talk to a random person they are pretty dumb, and you find random people at busses. No, that's not how randomness works. If you talk to sufficiently many random people, you will likely get a wide distribution of people. Besides, talking to strangers is not a good measure, because people are often guarded around strangers. Especially on the bus, I thought people who tried to talk to me out of the blue were a…

It's also not random. I've talked a couple of times in my life to strangers in public transport, well, they actually talked to me, both times somehow accidentally people who I talked to were IT professionals, one was a programmer, the other one was a sysadmin and it was in the 90s in former soviet republic, hard to randomly encounter such people back then.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#78

Post by username90 » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:18 PM UTC

spacekitcat wrote: post #75

username90 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meritocracy is a good thing and we should never stop striving for it. The problem isn't that some strive for meritocracy, the problem is when people argue that they are meritocratic when they aren't. It is pretty easy to argue that there is plenty of merit in hiring women, like adding diversity to teams has benefits and so on, I don't see why you need to argue against the concept itself. > The concept of a meritocrac…

I think proponents of meritocracy are naive.

People who think that white men will hire more minorities and women if they focused less on merit are naive.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#79

Post by _qulr » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:25 PM UTC

jariel wrote: post #71

_qulr wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then hop on the bus and have conversations with the 'average person'. You fill find somewhat less conscientious, less interested, less curious, less intelligent people. Wow, this is jaw-dropping stereotype. I used to ride the bus, and unsurprisingly, my level of intelligence was completely unaffected by the mode of transportation I happened to be using at the time. Also, public transportation is more environmentall…

As a non-car owner, I ride the bus almost daily. The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense, at least in terms of wage earning potential. Ironically it would be someone without exposure to the 'bus world' who would have some utopian view that somehow all these bus riders are 'the same as professionals'. My hunch is that it is white,…

> As a non-car owner, I ride the bus almost daily.

> The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense,

You ride the bus. Some university educated white collar tech workers ride the bus. So why even bring up the bus? Denigrating bus riders doesn't help your argument at all, it's a red herring, as is speaking of "average" people, because averages often overlook the wide range of values within the population.

> at least in terms of wage earning potential.

That's not the interesting question here, otherwise "we have a meritocracy" would be almost a tautology.

> 'The bus' (esp. not the subway) is the domain of the urban working class - full stop.

Maybe we shouldn't full stop, but rather talk about the demographics of the urban working class...

> "is more environmentally friendly" - this is irrelevant to the argument - the question is, why imbue the debate with side-show moralizing?

Because riding the bus could be seen as a sign of conscientiousness, education, and intelligence, in contrast to your characterization of bus riders, and refusal to ride the bus as a sign of selfishness and immorality. Personally, I make no generalizations about bus riders. I tended to keep to myself on public transportation and thought it strange when someone wanted to talk to a stranger out of the blue. So it would be very unlikely for anyone to have experienced an intelligent, interesting conversation with me on the bus, regardless of my level of intelligence.

> the system is crudely meritocratic

This is not the defense you think it is. Few think the system is entirely random, or on the other hand, perfect. The level of crudeness is precisely why we're constantly debating the system.

Re: Meritocracies Are Unfair – and That's the Point

#80

Post by spacekitcat » Sun, Dec 20, 2020, 7:27 PM UTC

username90 wrote: post #78

spacekitcat wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think proponents of meritocracy are naive.

People who think that white men will hire more minorities and women if they focused less on merit are naive.

Striving to build an environment where effort is made to attribute credit where it's due and to strive for equality of outcome for all is what we need to do. You're still picking the 'best person for the job' according to your own biases for what constitutes the 'best' (because how else could it work?), but you're also making an effort to ensure that your team/department/company isn't just all white (straight etc) men.