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Elite Underproduction

troynikov.io

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Re: Elite Underproduction

#181

Post by ClumsyPilot »

native_samples wrote: post #89
robbmorganf wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> overproduction of physics PhDs relative to academic positions available Why are positions researching physics so closely tied to academic positions? We probably don't need too many more physics professors but we sure could use more physics research. Or maybe better physics research. Either way, more/better physics discoveries. That said, our scientific communication channels seem filled to the brink. So maybe we ne…

Do we need more physics research? I guess it depends a lot on how you define physics, but it seems like outside of possibly better silicon nodes, there isn't a whole lot of low hanging fruit in physics at the moment. When physics does get research funding it gets dropped into building giant machines that, at vast expense, have discovered virtually nothing. It feels like right now most areas of academia are consuming…

The 'normal' matter is 5% of the universe, do we need to know what the other 95% is? Do we need working nuclear fusion? Etc.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#182

Post by rtpg »

andreilys wrote: post #62

In our society, Elite Overproduction can be explained as a form of Malthusian social competition where only so many resources and only so much status is available, and the only way to access a satisfactory slice is to compete within the power structures that control them. In turn, our institutions evolve mainly to facilitate this competition rather than performing their ostensible material functions. In turn this cau…

Law is an interesting example, cuz it has so many points of the non-static nature of all of this.

The number of people on the SC changes. The relative status of being a fancy defense lawyer changes. We could in the future set term limits to court judges. there are appelate courts (which are pretty close to the top)!. We could pack the court! We could also make it so that being a lawyer isn't actually prestigious, as a society. We could also stop just choosing people from Harvard & Yale.

There are so many choices as a society about what is done, and how many people are or are not needed in certain roles, that the implicit premise in all of this (that the current state of things involve some static limits, _and_ that we have reached those limits right now, instead of 100 years ago or 100 years from now) doesn't stand. Even if I agree that everybody in US elite political circles going through law school is extremely bizarre and bad, I don't think either argument presented in the article holds up.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#183

Post by novok »

fullshark wrote: post #45

Most of the frontiers our society explored and expanded in the last 80 years were borne from world war 1 and 2 technological advancements I'd argue, more so than true elites emerging (or those elites emerged due to WW2, e.g. Turing and Von Braun). If you agree with the author that we need these frontiers, then that's a scary thing for the future of civilization.

Nuclear bombs and rockets came out of WW2, but the revolutions of general relativity and quantum physics were being researched without any war to create them.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#184

Post by ch4s3 »

wpietri wrote: post #163
ch4s3 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's sort of what I'm driving at. I would note that anarcho-capitalists are not pro social hierarchy which is a central belief in right wing political philosophy. Murray Rothbard described the ideology as being neither of the left nor fo the right, basically saying that self ownership is incompatible with both traditions. Notwithstanding Thiel isn't and anarcho-capitalist, he seems in practice to be almost a neocon…

> anarcho-capitalists are not pro social hierarchy Are you sure about that? I mean, I believe they don't explicitly argue for it. But the ones I've come across seem to be practically in favor of the sort of wealth concentration and freedom of the rich to do as they please that they seem to be effectively in favor of strong social hierarchy.

Some of them are natural law types and some are definitely misanthropic but they are all opposed to central authority and hierarchy. The high concentration of wealth we see today seems to be met with Teo main responses by the more well read ancaps I know. They either view it as the result of government capture or in some cases the reward for finding a great idea first. I think it’s a weak spot for them ideologically, personally.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#185

Post by novok »

b9a2cab5 wrote: post #43
finexplained wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really think the connection you're trying to draw follows immediately. There are very strong domestic students, probably enough to fill all the top PhD programs. The calculus for pursuing a PhD is different if you're a domestic vs international student. If you're international and want to move to and eventually live in the US, where some of the highest paying jobs in the world are available, then first gettin…

If that was the case then FAANG wouldn't be filled with Asians and engineers from ex-Soviet countries. The makeup of high paying tech companies does not represent in any way the makeup of the American population. I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism. If you look at top public school undergrad programs that don't practice affirmative action (UC's, UW) the programs are almost…

%34 of the world population are from India and China. And to be honest there isn't as many ex-soviet engineers in FANG as you would think, they are vastly outnumbered to chinese and indian engineers.

When you hire the world, your demographics are going to represent the world for the most part. There are a few modifications as to why latin america, africa and developed nation people are not as well represented, but it still holds.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#186

Post by lmm »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #177
lmm wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why are positions researching physics so closely tied to academic positions? Because it's cheaper that way. A lab that had to pay market-rate salaries would be outcompeted by the ones that sucker grad students with the promise that a few of them might get tenure someday and pay them peanuts in the meantime.

There's nothing stopping the new lab from also offering the possibility of tenure. Why would it be outcompeted?

It would be outcompeted because other labs could hire many more grad students for the same cost.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#187

Post by novok »

ryandrake wrote: post #33
kafkaIncarnate wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are you getting that $200k figure? These are for not just out of college: https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/computer-science-salary-S... https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Co... https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Degree=Master_of_Scienc...

OP said you can make $200k straight out of undergrad, which is probably technically true, like it's technically true that I can win the lottery or get struck by lightning. There is probably a new grad somewhere making $200k in far-far right tail of the distribution. Just like it's technically true that you can make $400k (or $600k or $1M, whatever the popular number to cite is now) as a software engineer. Yes, these…

No it's not a lie, look at levels.fyi

If your not from a top school , maybe you have to work in startups or lesser tier companies for $50k less for a year or two, and then go work at MAGMA at the same pay as your stanford equivalent peer.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#188

Post by ClumsyPilot »

slt2021 wrote: post #91
RNCTX wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If that was the case then FAANG wouldn't be filled with Asians and engineers from ex-Soviet countries. The makeup of high paying tech companies does not represent in any way the makeup of the American population. I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism. In a land where money buys everything, you think culture is the reason why a thing exists or doesn't exist? I think you're…

do you really think that FAANG companies want to pay less? they are already top paying employers, i think you are mistaken

"do you really think that FAANG companies want to pay less?"

That's the basic premise of markets.

Conversely, they are posting huge profits, why don't they pat even more?

Re: Elite Underproduction

#189

Post by cema »

wpasc wrote: post #2

I strongly agree with the premise of the article, and I wish more of society was aware of the issues that propagate what the author calls "Elite Underproduction". However, while I agree with the premise, I think the precise factors that create this issue are not sufficiently discussed or agreed upon (Not enough money goes into science research? Regulation imposes too heavy a burden on the outputs of scientific endeav…

Looks like you are talking about https://podcastnotes.org/portal-with-eric-weinstein/thiel/ from 2019, correct? Sounds interesting, thanks!

Re: Elite Underproduction

#190

Post by ClumsyPilot »

rayiner wrote: post #158
_jal wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These are arguably even less valuable than the cultural norms of Bible-thumping small towns. Since you seem to be a fan of intellectual rigor, can you describe the process by which you arrive at the relative worth of (apparently) social science programs vs. small town social behavior? Can that method also tell us whether citrus flavors are more valuable than ballet?

Both social sciences and cultural studies are quite self consciously meant to be applied to understanding and improving society. It’s not the study of dead societies, but our own. Culture, meanwhile, is the organically developed heuristics and norms of communities. You can measure the relative worth of these things by looking at the functioning of society on various metrics. Unlike say civil engineers, practitioners…

"Millennials as a generation are the richest ever"

That's plain wrong, they have less disposable income and lower net worth than the two generations before them had at the same stage in their life.

Just because stock market grew doesn't mean life of an average Joe improved.

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