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Comment by smsm42 | Hacker News Reader

I'm afraid if we will start measuring people by their "social worthiness" we'd very quickly arrive to conclusions which most readers of the New Yorker would be very reluctant to support. At least I hope they would.

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Especially when you consider that the New Yorker is the newsletter of the Old Money class. They'll be first up against the wall come any revolution, long before "the bankers".

Was there an "Occupy Old Money" protest I didn't hear about?

No, but there is thousands of years of history that show us what happens in revolutions of that nature.

Occupy was a glorified flash mob. The real revolution, when it happens, will not be tweeted.

It seems to me that there is a schism between the financial industry and others harboring huge wealth.

For example, a lot of wealthy people are honestly or pretend to be libertarians. Libertarians don't seem to be very fond of the finical industry.

I wonder why this is?

Will we also get to these horrible terrible conclusions if we start measuring jobs by their social worthiness?

Probably. If you want to be a history scholar but the society decides it'd be better off if you dug trenches or picked apples - would that be horrible terrible for you or just fine?

It would be horrible terrible if society ordered me to go dig trenches, yeah. But if society merely stopped paying me 500K a year to be a history scholar, I think that might be acceptable. That is, if being a history scholar were as worthless to society as the things investment bankers allegedly do.

Society does not pay any banker 500K. Their clients and employers might. If you want to prevent it because you think it's bad for the society - it is the same idea as sending you to dig trenches because society thinks it's better for you to be this way. If the society can remove the banker from his job - he can remove you from yours.

> Society does not pay any banker 500K. Their clients and employers might.

Bailouts.

I was told bailout are necessary to save the economy, not to pay the bankers. By the same regulators btw. Could it be the regulators lied? If so, why would you want more liars in charge?

Don't forget about the revolving door between the finance industry and the people who regulate it.

This is called "regulatory capture", I mentioned it in another comment in this discussion.

I still feel you're radicalizing the question too much. Some jobs are already banned by society even though clients would pay a lot for them. That doesn't make society a dystopia...

Their clients and employers are members of society.

Actually, it's the other way around: investment bankers conned society into giving them cushy jobs. When you look at the bulk of those accounts, what so you see? Pension funds. How much control do average people have over their pension funds? Almost none, because there are all kinds of rules and regulations "to protect the public" -- except that they don't, so the cycles of haphazard investment and bailouts repeat themselves.

>>> because there are all kinds of rules and regulations "to protect the public"

So what you need to fix this? Of course, more rules and regulations. Because there's no problem with rules and regulations that can not be fixed by more rules and regulations.

Possibly: on the phenomenon of bullshit jobs http://www.strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/

How do you have an objective measure of "social worthiness"?

> I'm afraid if we will start measuring people by their "social worthiness" we'd very quickly arrive to conclusions which most readers of the New Yorker would be very reluctant to support.

Could you elaborate for a non-American, please?

The New Yorker is a very affluent magazine for a pretty upper class crowd, in general. Its likely that these findings would put a lot of those professions (such as hedge fund traders) low on the list of social worth while listing much poorer classes (like teachers) on a higher tier. This would not be a popular view among members of that hedge fund trader class.

Thanks :-)

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