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Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

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Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#71

Post by dasil003 »

dsacco wrote: post #66
sol_remmy wrote: post #58

Everyone in this thread directly supports inequality through their buying decisions and I'm callin' them out. Anytime you use Netflix, Google, HackerNews is supporting inequality. Every time you bought a Harry Potter book as a kid you supported inequality. You're giving more money to the winners. If you want to reduce inequality, then buy books from unpopular authors. Use unpopular OSes like TempleOS instead of givin…

I'm not going to respond to most of your comment, but this suggestion is pretty weird: > Use unpopular OSes like TempleOS instead of giving even more market share to Google/Apple/Microsoft ...Why? You could also just use Linux or BSD. TempleOS seems like a very odd suggestion for people looking to cut out non-free operating systems cold turkey. Edit: In case this isn't clear, I'm responding to the commenter's commerc…

The GP is about popularity not freedom.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#72

Post by falcolas »

kaolti wrote: post #16
newyankee wrote: post #2

One of the biggest lie sold in the West is that if you work hard, give everything you should succeed. This has grave implications on policy and really blinds people born with a silver spoon to the real problems in society as they have a 'i deserve it and they don't syndrome'. Contrast this with a poor society that is growing rapidly where you see islands of wealths with certain individuals, at least people over there…

Why is it a lie? Do you disagree that hard work leads to success, within limits?

Hard work only increases the chance for opportunities, to a certain ceiling. It is not, however, the only factor. Or even the most important factor.

Let's use a few sterotypes for examples: A hard working trucker will take years to set aside $10,000 in savings. An average programmer at a financial institution can do the same in months. A debutante able hire a stock broker to invest their slush fund can do the same in hours.

The trucker, in terms of advancement and opportunities, will probably max out at running their own owner-operator business. Maybe they'll get really lucky and be able to employ other drivers as well.

The programmer can probably keep raising their pay by hopping jobs every few years, until they can retire by playing the financial market with his savings.

The debutante just keeps being a debutante.

We could call the trucker the successful one - they ended up with their own business. And there's a cost, too. All of that long haul driving and manual labor moving freight has left them with severe, if managable, back pain. However in terms of capital, in terms of being able to pay for a loved one's fight against cancer, the truck driver isn't even a blip on the radar.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#73

Post by steaknsteak »

frgtpsswrdlame wrote: post #33
kaolti wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone is saying they are irrelevant, nothing is black and white. For practical purposes however, hard work does lead to success.

You've never known a hard-working person who wasn't successful?

It's moreso that the inverse is true. Not working hard will almost certainly not lead to success (unless your family is rich enough to where you can just "buy" more success). Working hard will not necessarily lead to success, but it's a prerequisite. The amount of work required also depends on what obstacles you're born with and degree of success is desired

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#74

Post by runeb »

sol_remmy wrote: post #58

Everyone in this thread directly supports inequality through their buying decisions and I'm callin' them out. Anytime you use Netflix, Google, HackerNews is supporting inequality. Every time you bought a Harry Potter book as a kid you supported inequality. You're giving more money to the winners. If you want to reduce inequality, then buy books from unpopular authors. Use unpopular OSes like TempleOS instead of givin…

How can it be inequality if you are not comparing someone who delivers the exact same service or product?

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#75

Post by aantix »

newyankee wrote: post #2

One of the biggest lie sold in the West is that if you work hard, give everything you should succeed. This has grave implications on policy and really blinds people born with a silver spoon to the real problems in society as they have a 'i deserve it and they don't syndrome'. Contrast this with a poor society that is growing rapidly where you see islands of wealths with certain individuals, at least people over there…

Whatever rules in life get laid out, whether it's scoring soccer goals or everyone gets X amount of food per month, someone always becomes good at "optimizing" those rules.

We are humans born with different abilities with different tastes and strive for different things. Equalizing the outcomes of all by artificially holding some back suppresses the very creative life force in each one of us, ends in misery and progress is hampered.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#76

Post by [deleted] »

troupe wrote: post #35
rainbowmverse wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you base this on? I know plenty of people working multiple jobs and saving every dollar they can who still barely get by.

You see many people in the United States who are working hard and avoiding foolish decisions that cannot seem to provide for their needs and set money aside for the future?

[deleted]

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#77

Post by k__ »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #60
k__ wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some parties here in Germany actively pushing this. They talk about equality of opportunity and not equality of outcomes. But what can you do? You're phenotype is mostly determined by stuff you can't control. If you have low conscientiousness and a low IQ, you're basically f*cked and you can't control this either. Even if you're high on openness and have a average to high IQ, you're still playing a high risk game.

I do agree to equality of opportunity and not equality of outcome; those people with low IQ won't end up in the high tiers of e.g. the scientific world, simply because they can't. Equality of opportunity does not rule out a proper socialist system. You give everyone the same opportunities at life and work by e.g. affordable health care and insurances for everyone, but also scholarships for everyone so they can follow…

I don't really think this is the problem here.

Sure, you shouldn't give any idiot a degree without doing something for it and yes, you shouldn't make it harder for intelligent people to get degrees, just because their parents are poor or something.

But if you have low conscientiousness and low IQ, that was also given to you without asking. It's playing on the same level as poor parents.

With your proposed change (which is already done in countries like Germany, we have almost free healthcare and education) you still have 50% of the population that has a IQ below 100.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#78

Post by solidsnack9000 »

In a meritocratic society, there is positive correlation between talent and success. But how steep should this relationship be? If the talent-success slope is very steep (i.e., a small talent difference causes a large capital gap), you might end up having a wide distribution of wealth (severe economic inequality). On the other hand, if the slope is quite flat (i.e., a big talent difference makes little difference in capital), the society has weak meritocracy, which may disincentivize people from achievements. The right degree of steepness depends on how one defines fairness and how much inequality a society can handle.

This discussion misses one important element of returns to talent: more capital in the hands of more capable people should result in better allocation of resources, and consequently better outcomes for society as a whole. Too little inequality would, according to this view, result in destruction of capital over time, and in consequence impoverish the society.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#79

Post by monocasa »

sol_remmy wrote: post #58

Everyone in this thread directly supports inequality through their buying decisions and I'm callin' them out. Anytime you use Netflix, Google, HackerNews is supporting inequality. Every time you bought a Harry Potter book as a kid you supported inequality. You're giving more money to the winners. If you want to reduce inequality, then buy books from unpopular authors. Use unpopular OSes like TempleOS instead of givin…

On the far left, there's a saying "there is no ethical consumption under capatalism". The idea is that 'voting with your wallet' comes from a position of privilege that by it's very nature can't receive the critical mass necessary to create change in inequality. The vast amount of people won't have the spare capital to spend on simply fighting inequality, so instead what you'll see is boutique industries that make upper middle class, center left consumers feel better, but don't create any actual change. See Toms.

Re: Talent, luck and success: simulating meritocracy and inequality

#80

Post by troupe »

runeb wrote: post #74
sol_remmy wrote: post #58

Everyone in this thread directly supports inequality through their buying decisions and I'm callin' them out. Anytime you use Netflix, Google, HackerNews is supporting inequality. Every time you bought a Harry Potter book as a kid you supported inequality. You're giving more money to the winners. If you want to reduce inequality, then buy books from unpopular authors. Use unpopular OSes like TempleOS instead of givin…

How can it be inequality if you are not comparing someone who delivers the exact same service or product?

It isn't the quality of the service or product that is being compared. It is the fact that when you buy from companies with really good/popular products you are doing so with a bunch of other people and that puts more money in the pockets of the people who made quality products. If you don't like them having lots of money, spend your money elsewhere.
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