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Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

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Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#301

Post by LouisSayers »

Mz wrote: post #294
LouisSayers wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never intended my initial post as a dismissal of hard work. I actually assumed that people would understand it to be an expansion of a common saying "It's not what you know, it's who you know" - although I didn't feel the quotes were necessary. I'm not saying that there's no value in meeting people online - I think that's quite different than having a million karma points on a forum however. I also don't know how y…

I do not really want to fight with you and I think you are reading in a bunch of stuff that is not there. But I do want to say framing matters and the quotation marks you left out would have helped, though probably not enough. Take care.

No worries, I guess our minds want to see what our minds want to see.

I wish you all the best with your situation.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#302

Post by rcafdm »

antisthenes wrote: post #298
rcafdm wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1: There were several concrete suggestions there. It's not mere "concern trolling". 2: Ending wasteful or very low value-add spending vis-a-vis "better outcomes for the poor" is useful regardless. Whatever your priorities, we can allocate those resources better. 3: Just because the economic and social woes of the poor are tough problems that admit of no easy solutions does not mean that we cannot speak frankly about…

So it's a moral argument of what you want to do with the "genetic inferiors" and how much resources you actually want to allocate helping them. That would require making a judgment call about their utility curve. Got it.

"Genetic inferiors" is your phrase, not mine, pal. I do not quite think of it in those terms and I am not advocating that we end the welfare state in its entirety. Quite the contrary actually, realistically assessing the evidence has lead me to be significantly more sympathetic to non-market remedies of various sorts. The main idea I am trying to communicate here is that if you actually want to help the poor, instead of just protecting your ideology from information not congenial to your world view, you are best advised to grapple with the evidence.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#303

Post by rcafdm »

ap22213 wrote: post #296
rcafdm wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd recommend focusing on policy that is actually informed by a realistic assessment of the evidence regardless of your personal views/preferences. In my view, we spend a tremendous amount of money on schools (over-funding -> fancy facilities, labs, etc), pre-K, enrichment programs and the like that have approximately no effect on predictors of future success, some direct evidence suggests does nothing for income/emp…

Do we really need genetic modification to address this though? Humans have had an effective history of inventing tools to scale their performance by magnitudes. For example, a Human was quite ineffective at digging the land so they invented the shovel and plow. There are a million examples, of course. Why would attributes of the mind somehow be impossible to similarly enhance? Anyway, it seems like you're main concer…

Sure, it'd be great of someone invented some kind of mental effort multiplier. We might even call these devices "computers" ;-) In all honesty though, (1) I don't know where to begin here (2) I'm not sure something akin to a "mental shovel" would significantly address the distributional issues. Some people are still going to be significantly more able than others.....

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#304

Post by prmph »

Mz wrote: post #80
chinese_dan wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A lot of people work their ass off just to pay the rent and feed their kids." We should also be questioning why someone that can barely pay the rent decides to have another kid (or even a kid at all). Financial management should be a bigger part of our education system. "Working your ass off does not imply wealth. That's the problem." It has never and should never imply wealth. When I was in college, I worked my ass…

We should also be questioning why someone that can barely pay the rent decides to have another kid (or even a kid at all). This statement is rife with all kinds of shitty assumptions. Until Obamacare came along, it was common for health insurance in the US to not cover birth control -- yet it often covered Viagra. So, a guy who is too old to get it up anymore is entitled to sexual pleasure, but a young woman servicin…

Wow, I respect this post and the poster

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#305

Post by randyrand »

hkt wrote: post #245
randyrand wrote: post #192

Why should a meritocracy be individual based instead of family based? I personally think it's okay for families to give their inheritance/assistance to their children even if the children don't "deserve" it. etc. Working towards bettering your children lives is a reason many of us get up in the morning.

Merit is to do with worth, not net worth. You can't inherit the ability to be good at anything, but you can inherit money and property. See the British upper class for a fine example of wealthy inheritors void of merit.

my point is a bit different than that.

A family generally supports each other and works together. Parents help the children, etc.

Knowing this, wouldn't it make more sense to see if our society follows a meritocracy on the family level than on the individual level? Individually our society might not follow a strong meritocracy, but familially we might.

Now the question exists, is that still a meritocracy? On the family level, yes.

Are we okay with giving up a meritocracy on the individual level to allow a family to help each other? Probably yes to that as well. We should be more concerned with family meritocracy than individual meritocracy IMO.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#306

Post by randyrand »

zzzeek wrote: post #208
randyrand wrote: post #192

Why should a meritocracy be individual based instead of family based? I personally think it's okay for families to give their inheritance/assistance to their children even if the children don't "deserve" it. etc. Working towards bettering your children lives is a reason many of us get up in the morning.

> Working towards bettering your children lives is a reason many of us get up in the morning. Absolutely! it's just that when someone has a lot of success because their family helped them, they are successful because of that help. It's not a "meritocracy". The same reasoning can be used to invalidate the claim that there is a "meritocracy" of families. If you claim "family X has more merit than family Y", well you ca…

> The same reasoning can be used to invalidate the claim that there is a "meritocracy" of families. If you claim "family X has more merit than family Y", well you can apply the same reasoning to show that just like person A got their privilege from family X, family X got their privilege from situation Q

Not at all. Situation Q could be the same among many families, but only a few will succeed.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#307

Post by randyrand »

hkt wrote: post #246
imtringued wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going the other way is far worse. Imagine a 100% inheritance tax. You basically get punished for helping your children and encouraged to spend your remaining money in a unproductive way. Inheritance only affects the children when the parents are already dead. It's too late to achieve equality when the children are already in their 40s. They've benefited from their parents during the time they were alive the most. Eve…

Not even slightly true. 100% inheritance tax means relative equality between members of the same generation. There are still differences in upbringing to contend with, but the extra tax money can fund education or other compensatory measures.

> 100% inheritance tax means relative equality between members of the same generation.

Not at all. Parents give much of their money while still alive.

Re: Poor kids who do things right don't do better than rich kids who do things wrong

#308

Post by randyrand »

collyw wrote: post #237
randyrand wrote: post #192

Why should a meritocracy be individual based instead of family based? I personally think it's okay for families to give their inheritance/assistance to their children even if the children don't "deserve" it. etc. Working towards bettering your children lives is a reason many of us get up in the morning.

Inheritance is the opposite of meritocracy, which we supposedly believe in.

Only if you assume a meritocracy has to be on the individual level.

A meritocracy of families vs meritocracy of individuals. Also, how do you contend with married people? Does it really make sense to look at how they perform on the individual level? Isn't it more of a group effort?

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