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Comment by yummyfajitas | Hacker News Reader

It's interesting how this article undermines most modern narratives about inequality while simultaneously maintaining a proper liberal mood affiliation.

According to the article, the "aristocracy" preserves itself by educating it's children well and teaching them to succeed on their own merits. Even then, those children must work extremely hard in order to maintain their position. And there are no real barriers to entry; in principle, anyone can do this, it's just that the wealthy are the ones who actually wind up doing this (probably because they are the ones who recognize the value of it).

In short, the 1% are the 1% because they are better than the rest, and through hard work and good parenting the same is true of their children.

Yet somehow, the article makes these exact same claims in a manner that will probably avoid anger by left wing sorts. I'm impressed.

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The narrative assumes that working hard necessarily creates value and thus merit, but that's not always true. For example, the Oracle Java lawsuit vs. Google, or SCO vs. IBM were immensely expensive, surely involved many of these grads, and yet created very little value to the majority of society. There are plenty of other frivolous lawsuits out there.

This narrative only escapes liberal disapproval if liberals fail to question the value of the legal process. So no better time to deliver this speech than a Yale Law commencement.

The narrative assumes that working hard necessarily creates value for oneself, by investing in oneself as an asset. It makes no claims to one's effort building value for society as a whole.

Exactly. As per my previous comment, the currency of merit being traded in the orator's meritocracy is only defined within the Ivy Leauge-al community. The currency of merit that SHOULD matter is based on the collective suffering of humanity.

That's certainly a valid reading but I doubt that's how liberals would read it. The parent comment points out that the article does much to avoid upsetting a liberal reading-- which is a good point (and I agree)-- but probably not liberals thinking critically of the piece (which they likely won't-- it's a commencement address).

For a moment let's say that you're correct: the 1% indeed worked harder and smarter than the 99% to get there. Even given that, I think the important point that you're missing from the speech is that they are being rewarded much, much more than they used to for that. I don't believe that they are working much, much harder, or that they are much, much smarter, it's just that the reward Pareto curve has gotten that much steeper.

And what I think the author is arguing is that that's not necessarily a deserved, or good, thing.

I very rarely hear people complaining that the rewards for hard work and good education are too high.

Usually the claim is that the people at the top inherited their position rather than earning it, and that others didn't have a fair shot at getting it.

Obviously the latter claim is a far better narrative.

If the rewards for the people at the very top are disproportionate to the work and risk-taking that they've put in, that's a distortion which has negative effects on the whole system.

We're talking about the "New Aristocracy". In extremis that's where you're either in the elite, or barely subsisting. It doesn't matter how meritorious the admissions to the upper class are - it's an awful way to live for nearly everyone, and where it's been implemented it's been marked by abuse and stagnation.

From a motivational standpoint, of course the incentives of a great reward matter. But there has to be a reason for everyone from 2nd place downward to participate.

In extremis that's where you're either in the elite, or barely subsisting.

You are conflating inequality with poverty. To recognize that they aren't the same thing, come visit the highly equal society of India or Bangladesh.

Also, the more you make a curve convex (and increasing), the more incentives it creates for everyone. Proof: convexity = u''(x). Increasing u''(x) increases u'(x)=int u''(x) dx. Since u'(x) is incentive, the proof is complete.

That's not the case at all: India has a GINI of 0.43, which is above the world average of 0.39. Sweden is at 0.23. Source:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_eq...

And while alleviating absolute poverty is great, the point I'm making is that a large middle class is a tremendous driver of many positive societal outcomes - politically, economically, and socially.

You can't just take a steepening reward structure out of that context.

You cherrypicked the one number (CIA GINI) for India that was above average, and not even above the US.

India UNR/P = 8.6, WB Gini = 33.6, CIA R/P = 8.6, CIA Gini = 42.8

USA UNR/P = 15.9, WB Gini = 41.1, CIA R/P = 15, CIA Gini = 45

I have no idea what you mean by "middle class" - there are many possible definitions.

Now that your claims about incentives and your conflation of poverty and inequality are debunked, you still believe that inequality is somehow bad? What facts (if any) would cause you to reject this belief?

Wait, wait. You're the one that claimed that India was a "highly equal society" - the burden of proof is on you. Your numbers are comparing India with the US, which is an unequal society, so you haven't provided it yet.

And you really believe that you've "debunked" my claims by referencing what happens to a pure mathematical abstraction? I'm not even sure how to address that. You can't honestly believe that models have influence over reality, and not the other way around?

And I'm not claiming that inequality is bad. It's necessary, for example, to accommodate risk. All I've said is that it matters how much inequality there is, and having too much distorts things. The only claim I've made as to what constitutes too much is the level found in aristocratic societies.

Are you arguing the opposite, that the degree of inequality has no great effect on a society? Or that the repercussions aren't negative as a country approaches the level that is marked by the formation of an aristocracy?

I shouldn't have said "highly equal", since that implies some sort of absolute standard of equality. It's certainly more equal than the US or UK, and according to all the statistics we've both cited except for CIA Gini, is comparable to France or other non-Scandinavian euro nations.

You made a mathematical claim about a mathematical construct (incentive): From a motivational standpoint, of course the incentives of a great reward matter. But there has to be a reason for everyone from 2nd place downward to participate.

I gave a mathematical response. If you don't believe that incentives govern behavior, then why did you bring them up and make incorrect claims about them?

The only argument I make is that I've seen no convincing evidence that inequality matters much. At best I've seen a few cross-country correlations between inequality and other bad things. Even left wing types don't find such evidence very convincing, or at least they don't after I replace the X axis with "% single mothers" or "% black people" (increasing both the r^2 and social unacceptability of the conclusion).

Well, in my mind you've exemplified perfectly what's wrong with libertarians: they believe models over reality. What else would let them so ardently believe in an economic system that's never been actually demonstrated to work.

You argue that, by mathematical definition, a steepening Pareto curve will increase motivation for everyone on it, and that: "Now that your claims about incentives and your conflation of poverty and inequality are debunked[...]"

Have you considered the possibility that in the actual world the curve doesn't strictly conform to the mathematical one? That it flattens early, or that the whole thing is translated downward? Or that it's not a Pareto curve but one that is similar? Or that (as has a lot of evidence behind it) that socially-based incentives are sensitive to relative inequality, not absolute? I pointed to an abstraction for illustration, and you made claims based on that abstraction and called it proof of the real world.

This is economics: there's no such thing as "debunking", there's no such thing as "proof". There's evidence, and there's models that maybe explain some aspects of it better than others, from a very narrow view. Models can't demonstrate anything, all they can do is suggest experiments to be carried out in the actual world, at which point what happens there trumps any claims that they may have made.

The only thing we really have is comparative studies, across nations and through time. Everything else is just fooling ourselves with our own metaphors.

So when you discard the only thing that we've got as "a few cross-country correlations between inequality and other bad things", what exactly are going going to replace that with, your theories? It must be nice to live in such a simple world.

There's no arguing with someone who believes economics to be an a priori formal science.

You argue that, by mathematical definition, a steepening Pareto curve

No, I didn't. The pareto curve is not the reward curve, which is what we were discussing.

Have you considered the possibility that in the actual world the curve doesn't strictly conform to the mathematical one?

I was explicitly assuming your hypothetical was true, and showing it doesn't support your conclusion. That's a conditional claim.

I pointed to an abstraction for illustration, and you made claims based on that abstraction and called it proof of the real world.

No, I called it proof that your argument is bunk. If you want to make an argument based on some complicated theory of socially-based incentives, you need to actually cite such things.

So when you discard the only thing that we've got as "a few cross-country correlations between inequality and other bad things", what exactly are going going to replace that with, your theories?

Tell me; if I can dig up a graph with a better r^2 and a different label on the X axis, will you change your views on inequality? I.e., if I show you this graph, will you say "oops, I'm wrong, inequality is not the issue, I guess $new_x_axis_label is the real problem here?" (Note that I will of course make $new_x_axis_label something socially unacceptable.)

If not, then your argument is simply dishonest. You are criticizing me for being unpersuaded by evidence that you would also find unpersuasive.

Incentive isn't u'(x), it's more like u'(x)/u(x).

Scaling u''(x) doesn't change inequality anyway (as defined by measurements of u(b)/u(a) or the Gini index) so it's a poor stand-in for the kind of convexity people are complaining about.

The incentive is how much your utility increases - between state B and state A, that's u(B)-u(A) = u'(h)(B-A). Take limits and you get to u'(x) for marginal estimates.

Inequality is most definitely NOT defined by ratios of a utility function. The convexity of the OP was in the utility function; he seemed to believe that convexity of reward (and hence of utility, assuming u(reward) is monotonic) would only increase the reward for those at the top.

Maybe you should have made clear in your post, then, that u is utility, not income. If u is utility and v is income, then v'(x)/v(x) ~ u'(x), more or less. Most measures of inequality involve dollar ratios, which seem to correspond to differences in utility, or at least to self-reported happiness.

Places like Harvard and Yale used to educate the elites themselves, but no more. Today the elites are the billionaires and hundred-millionaires who own the country's capital. Harvard and Yale educate the people who work directly for the elites - lawyers, CEOs, financiers, etc.

Like the Praetorian Guard of Ancient Rome, they derive significant power and wealth from the fact that they take orders directly from the elites. But since they are not the actual elite, they must endure intense vetting and culling at every level, and work hard often in harsh conditions (also like the Praetorians of old).

So the comparison in the original PDF is not exactly apples to apples.

The most important point in the narrative about inequality is that big inequalities are bad for society.

You don’t need a cast of super-rich, and the rest deep in debt in order to motivate people to perform. But this is where we are going.

The 'no left wing’ narrative if this: ‘we deserve it because we are better’.

It’s not really a very original claim.

All the privileged ‘classes’ in human history say that. In medieval Europe, Japan or anywhere, there was a warrior cast. These people were trained from birth to fight. They were also better feed and, as result, they were bigger. What do you think this people thought about their rights?

That doesn’t mean that personal merit doesn’t exist or that we shouldn’t reward it. It just mean that we have to be very aware of what are the trends and where this kind of thing goes if there is not some kind of corrective force in the system.

The warrior caste probably were better warriors. The only question remaining is "is it just to reward people proportionally to warrior skills?"

Similarly, for the modern day US, "is it just to reward people proportionally to hard work, intelligence and the ability to produce things that people want?"

Well you paint a very fantastical and alluring picture but more realistically in the modern day US we ask: is it just to reward people for developing the social connections necessary to succeed, from birth or happenstance, cultivating the culture, personality, and attitude required to fit into successful career paradigms (generally trained through family and upbringing) and the ability to convince or force people to give you more value than the value of the service which you provide in exchange -- the very definition of profit.

And in fact if you begin asking about justice the immediate answer is of course 'no'; anyone wishing to defend the status quo had better avoid framing the question in terms of justice, and rather try to take the more property-oriented tact common among libertarians: is it morally acceptable to prevent people from choosing exactly what to do with their property for the goals of justice and common good? Obviously yes, but how much?

The premise I'm taking - coming from the original article - is that it's hard work and ability which gets you into the elite rather than social connections. If you want to argue this premise is wrong, that's a separate issue.

Also, the definition of profit is price - cost.

Well you're right -- the article is all about hard work and ability /to succeed in undergraduate and graduate admissions contests/ -- I would argue that the social connections are for many the end goal, which you receive after proving you're worthy (and end up at an Ivy, for example) and it is these that actually catapult you into the elite, so hard work is a means to an end.

But this is tangential -- for me the concern is that in the article the writer skims over what kind of hard work and ability is really needed to run this gauntlet of constant judgement and admission from ages 4-25. It is not technical skills or intelligence or even hard work necessarily, but rather an ability and willingness to transform oneself into the kind of person that wins admissions contest. Success doesn't track ability, we've designed a system where we take success as a sign of ability but it actually measures a willingness and ability to conform to admissions standards and do as instructed, and we use this willingness and ability to change oneself as a proxy for actual ability. My argument is that this proxy isn't necessarily a very accurate one.

And I'm glad we agree on the definition of profit. I of course know the economist's definition and agree with it, I just gave what I consider to be a more revealing and honest characterization of it.

"The warrior caste probably were better warriors"

I think your are missing the point. The warrior caste were better warriors because they were born in a warrior caste.

What that have to do with justice is left as an exercise for the reader.

>Similarly, for the modern day US, "is it just to reward people proportionally to hard work, intelligence and the ability to produce things that people want?"

You've reversed the causality. Remember, we're asking for a definition of merit that is not isomorphic to "whatever the current economy rewards". We're trying to ask if we can hold the current economy to an external, human standard of performance, rather than just taking it at its own word that "when the numbers go up, it's good" (with the associated problem that even by this standard, "the numbers" have been growing more slowly and crashing more frequently since the rise of inequality began again in the '70s and '80s).

> And there are no real barriers to entry

There are barriers to entry. Children taught with care, with consistent discipline, attention, etc. will do better.

When mom and dad are out working and unavailable to lend a hand with homework, children will not do well. When mom and dad work blue collar jobs where they don't use skills that are marketable for the world tomorrow, children are left on their own to do things children do. When mom and dad are angry and bitter because of their misfortunes, children will very possibly be on the receiving end of unwarranted yelling.

Time, stress-free lives, roof on your head -- these are increasingly luxuries that even middle class folks cannot afford. Not having them is the barrier.

First of all, a barrier to entry is a barrier which would prevent a high human capital poor person from entering. The fact that poor people don't have high human capital is a separate issue.

Also, your narrative explaining why poor people have low human capital directly conflicts with the evidence. It's the hard working, highly stressed, wealthy people who's children are raised well.

https://www.nber.org/digest/jul06/w11895.html

In contrast, the lower income people living a life of leisure are the ones who's children are raised poorly.

http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/cps/a-profile-of-the-working...

I have no idea what you are talking about with "roof on your head". If you google statistics on working hours (you probably need to multiply annual hours worked and labor force participation), you'll see that hours worked per capita hasn't changed drastically since the 70's.

The fact that poor people don't have high human capital is a separate issue.

It just moves the barrier.

It's the hard working, highly stressed, wealthy people who's children are raised well.... In contrast, the lower income people living a life of leisure are the ones who's children are raised poorly.

To be charitable, I'm betting that "hard working" and "leisure" have special definitions in this context.

Hard working = spends many hours engaged in work for pay.

By "life of leisure", I mean a life in which one does not need to work at all in order to have the necessities of life provided. This is the traditional definition of the phrase, no?

No. I don't think a person who is living at a bare subsistence level would be said to be living a life of leisure.

Also, a person could have a seemingly easy job that pays a lot, or a hard job that pays little. In my view your distinctions are wrung to fit the point you're trying to make.

You seem to have confused the US with India.

Basically no one in the US is living at a "bare subsistence level". People with $0 in market income still consume approx $20k/year in the US, which is more than 3x the mean income (after adjusting for cost of living) over here. If $20k is "bare subsistence" then I should be surrounded by at least 500M corpses.

I don't think is fair to compare the working hours of the guy that goes to work in his BMW, sit in his office thinking strategy while his secretary serve him coffee and filter any interruption, with the guy that catch the bus to work 10 minimum wage hours.

With enough experts you can prove anything:

http://www.poverty.ac.uk/report-parenting-families-low-incom...

http://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/stress-in-low-income-fam...

> in principle, anyone can do this.

Anyone with the money. It's important that we don't forget how significant financial capital is on the outcome of childrens lives.

A good case study is on those two Colombian twins that were separated at birth.

I think it's wrong to believe the claims that Yale, Harvard, etc. have actually become meritocracies.

They absolutely are not. For undergrad, these ivy league schools are much more forgiving of grades from elite high schools.

"Well rounded" or "holistic" admissions also strongly favor upper and upper middle class activities and talents.

Admissions are gamed to such a large degree that it's all a game that is played out year in advance. And the middle class and poor students don't even know it's being played.

Every god is a true god.

Every ideology is not an ideology.

Every elite is a God-blessed meritocracy.

>And there are no real barriers to entry; in principle, anyone can do this

Does private schooling provide no benefit?

Private tutoring?

Family donations to elite schools?

Legacy admission?

Further:

Does food security provide no benefit to the ability to learn and retain information?

Does a violent environment offer the equivalent value as a non-violent environment, in terms of being able to focus on schoolwork?

Does a multi-parent child receive no additional educational advantage over a single-parent child?

Does having access to paid resources not offer any benefit?

Does attending better funded public schools not matter?

Does having better paid teachers not matter?

Does having the right cultural and social experiences not matter for forming networking relationships?

Does living amongst primarily successful and well educated people offer no advantage offer growing up amongst poor uneducated people?

You are missing the actual realities of trying to educate a poor child versus a rich child. Money grants you educational advantages in hundreds of ways.

You absolutely /can/ buy a better education. Full stop.

The only thing you've mentioned which is a barrier to entry (to elite schools, e.g. Yale) is legacy admission and donations.

The remainder are merely possible causes for non-elite people having lower merit. They are not barriers for a meritorious non-elite person to attend Yale or join the elite.

Oh i totally forgot how having no access to food means you have less merit.

Yeah, wow now that you spelled that out - i can totally see your point.

Trump 2016

> In short, the 1% are the 1% because they are better than the rest, and through hard work and good parenting the same is true of their children. Yet somehow, the article makes these exact same claims in a manner that will probably avoid anger by left wing sorts. I'm impressed.

Why, no, actually we are impressed.

It takes extraordinary, breathtaking ignorance (or maybe just eternal self-serving bullshit) to overlook centuries of the discrimination and outright violence that the 1% have strangely required and thus perpetuated, when your smug little delusionary claim is that, shucks, it's all merit-based riches.

According to the article, the "aristocracy" preserves itself by educating it's children well and teaching them to succeed on their own merits.

Disclaimer: I may have to plead "guilty as charged" here, if I'm allowed the conceit of placing myself in this aristocracy. Educating our children well has been a defining theme of the culture of my family, going back generations.

With that said, however, a strong factor in educating children to join any "ocracy" is wealth. This can't be overlooked. This aristocracy is not only providing education, but also the environment within which kids can receive that education continuously from birth through young adulthood and possibly beyond. This environment is safe, engaging, surrounded by educated and education-loving adults, and free of violence.

Also, I tend to prefer saying something like "valuable work" rather than "hard work." From my vantage point, hard work is something like carrying a hod, working in a call center, or some other kind of physically or emotionally stressful labor. I hope to never do hard work if I can avoid it.

The article states "The excess educational investment [...] that children born into a typical one percenter household receive is equivalent, economically, to a traditional inheritance of between 5 and 10 million dollars per child": it _does_ cost money to provide this kind of environment. This is why the 1% gives birth to the next 1%, not because they're better than the rest (again, according to the article).

Thanks. I hadn't thought of it in those terms.

The middle class can't afford tutors, private school and the time to shuffle kids around to various enrichment activities.

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