The Dower Power Hour

The United States of America has a permanent identity crisis.  This crisis spawns from two core values which are in constant conflict.  The U.S. envisions itself as a place of equality and a place where competition lets the competent rise to the top, in other words, a meritocracy.  Most Americans don’t even perceive the discrepancy.  Those that do identify the problem can explain it away with the statement that they believe in, not equality of economic positions, but equality of opportunity.  In other words, that giving everyone a fair playing field and then letting the best man/woman win solves the conflict.

I don’t think this is really true.  For every person that is above average, someone has to be equally far below average.  For every “best and brightest” there must be a worst and dimmest.  Even if equality of opportunity was achieved - and this alone is virtually impossible considering inherited wealth, social status, and even genetic traits which predispose someone towards success or failure - we wouldn’t really want a system where people who weren’t competent enough to succeed reaped the consequences of their disposition.  Such an environment would be fair, but I think society acknowledges that justice must be tempered with mercy.  Even people who lack the intelligence or aptitude to achieve greatness deserve to have shelter and food.

Thus, as a society we have decided that there ought to be some minimum, a rock bottom above the actual rock bottom, at which point our society will step in and prevent that individual from falling any lower.  This is the source of our welfare programs and Social Security.  But someone has to pay for those program and the more equity, the higher we raise that bottom tier, the lower the average becomes.  The bigger the welfare and health care programs become, the more the free market falters.  So is it better to live in a society where one person has $80 and the other person has $20 or where one person has $60 and the other person has $35.  The second system is certainly less efficient, but it might still be a better society to live in.

Nowhere is this discrepancy more obvious than in the system of universities in America.  We want every American to be able to attend college.  At the same time, we want highly selective, competitive schools that only accept the most intelligent and hardworking.

I think the last century has seen America shift away from equality of opportunity and towards equality of result.  The last twenty years have seen a backlash against this trend, but relatively speaking, the difference between American ideals in 1900 and 2000 is undeniable.  Certainly there are arguments to be made both ways and at extremes, both an unrestricted meritocracy and a complete egalitarian society are flawed.  However, I would argue that there are enough positive externalities associated with egalitarianism (benefits not factored into the equation) to make me lean a little bit towards equality of result.  Having a laissez-faire economy might produce a wealthier society on average, but when you factor in all the other negatives that are associated with it:

• Higher rates of homicide.
• Higher rates of violent crime.
• Higher costs per person for police protection.
• Higher rates of incarceration.
• Less state funds spent per person on education.
• Fewer books per person in the schools.
• Poorer educational performance, including worse reading skills, worse math skills.
• Higher infant mortality rates.
• Higher death rates for all age groups.
• A greater percentage of people without medical insurance.
• A greater proportion of babies born with low birth weight.
• A greater proportion of the population unable to work because of disabilities.
• Higher costs per-person for medical care.

They did a survey (in America) and gave people two choices for places to live.  In the first environment, the average income was $200,000 per year but you have $100,000.  In the second, the average income is only $25,000 but you have $50,000.  The value of the dollar is the same in both societies.  The vast majority of survey-takers chose to live in the second environment.