The traits that correlate most strongly to success in life are intelligence and delayed gratification. To make life even more unfair, both traits are significantly heritable.
There's a place for society to try to mitigate the negative effects of structural inequality and lack of mobility. But that doesn't mean we should pretend the non-structural factors that play a big part in outcomes don't exist. This is where the progressive left has a lot in common with the religious right, in their suppression of science that doesn't suit their sacred values and narratives.
Is anyone seriously arguing that "non-structural" factors don't or shouldn't play a role? That all individuals should have the same outcomes? Of course not.
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"Life of Russian hockey veterans is very hard," said Soviet hockey star Sergei Makarov. "Most of them don't have enough to eat these days. These old players are Russian legends."
File it under example 103847594029 of life being not fair.
I, like every from every person from every past generation, have been hearing that "life isn't fair" all my life. It may sound a little silly, but this millennial is just finally getting around to fully understand what that means, and to truly accept that.
I don't know whether to blame (which I am now using that word ironically) my upbringing, schooling, the kids television programming, or our greater Canadian society as a whole, but thinking back I sort of misunderstood "Life isn't fair" to mean "There will be challenges and adversity to overcome, but all will be right in the end if you work hard, believe in yourself, etc. etc. Bad guys always get their comeuppance and good guys always win in the end". All that hokey ####.
Finally, and with no hint on jadedness or nihilism, I am coming to around to accepting that no, not everything can be made perfectly right. It isn't one perspective on life, it's the facts, and any other view is a delusion. Again, this might sound a little silly to some, but there is a subtlety there that I'm just finally understanding and accepting, a little later in life than some. And that isn't to say we shouldn't stand up for what's right, and fight against injustice. We just have to be sure the fight is truly worth spending some of our short lives on.
I see it as a good thing if the self-improvement doctrine of Jordan Peterson reaches more young people. I'm not sure if anything he says is novel, but he has the platform now, and his "rules" seem to a have positive message and positive influence on a lot of people. Peterson's self-improvement message can be distilled as "life isn't fair, so work hard at making yourself a better person, and if everyone works on themselves this way, life can be a little better for everyone" (again...not exactly novel). There is no perfection or utopia to achieve, just lower levels of suffering. And it's not that this is good or bad, it just is, so we have to accept it. I wish I intuitively understood this when I was younger.
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It wasn't taken out of context. The rest of your post was a fabricated example. The part I wanted to address was the part I quoted.
Would you mind clarifying what argument you are trying to make then? My response to Dirac was that being successful doesn’t mean that you’re naturally smarter and more productive than the population at large. You make a lot of points that suggest you are not in disagreement with that.
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Of course opportunity matters, but an individual still has to be able to take advantage of any opportunity. There are very few low-intelligence individuals that can be come very successful based solely on opportunities. Again, they would be the exception.
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Like I said, I acknowledge that there are exceptions and outliers.
The fact that there are any examples at all of low intelligence individuals who are successful is exactly the point. Having success doesn’t mean you are naturally smarter and more productive than the population at large by default.
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However, I would take exception with your use of Galen Weston as an example (and the snarky undertone).
That’s unfortunate.
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Under his stewardship, Loblaws has been a roaring success. It is also a publicly traded company and if he weren't at least qualified (if not the most qualified, then he would likely not be the CEO, regardless of his last name and any implied nepotism.
Are you suggesting the shareholders wouldn’t allow it? Are you aware that George Weston Ltd own around 50% of Loblaws? Do you wanna guess which family has the majority ownership in George Weston Ltd? That’s quite a bit of influence on the matter.
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To put it another way, if he had different parents and a different upbringing, he may not have become CEO of Loblaws, but I would expect that he would still be successful.
Had he been born dirt poor I’m sure he would have still gone to Harvard as well, he would have just relied on his drive to be the best to get him there right?
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I think everyone generally agrees. Knowing a lot of "successful" people, I sometimes take exception with any notion that they generally don't "deserve it" and are only there through dumb luck, being part of the lucky sperm club, screwing someone over or a dirty combination of all three. Of course there are examples out there, but those are an infinitesimally small portion of "successful" people and I feel the vast majority of successful people probably deserve more credit for their position in life than what is generally afforded to them.
No one is arguing that successful people don’t deserve credit for their actual accomplishments.
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Would you mind clarifying what argument you are trying to make then? My response to Dirac was that being successful doesn’t mean that you’re naturally smarter and more productive than the population at large.
By and large, yes, it does.
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The fact that there are any examples at all of low intelligence individuals who are successful is exactly the point. Having success doesn’t mean you are naturally smarter and more productive than the population at large by default.
By and large, yes, it does.
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Are you suggesting the shareholders wouldn’t allow it? Are you aware that George Weston Ltd own around 50% of Loblaws? Do you wanna guess which family has the majority ownership in George Weston Ltd? That’s quite a bit of influence on the matter.
Again with the snark... If he was not qualified for the job (aka smart and hard-working), he would not have the job. End of story.
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Had he been born dirt poor I’m sure he would have still gone to Harvard as well, he would have just relied on his drive to be the best to get him there right?
I didn't say he would follow the same path, just that he would likely be successful, regardless of his starting point.
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No one is arguing that successful people don’t deserve credit for their actual accomplishments.
Good. It would be unfortunate if there was a resentful undertone in some posts that implied successful people weren't successful because they are intelligent and hard working, but rather simply because of circumstance.
I think most success comes from those that are not only smarter and more productive, but have the gift of foresight. They ask themselves the question, "What do people need now and are going to need in the foreseeable future?"
This idea became evident to me by tracing my family history. I learned how six Irish brothers, who emigrated to Canada in the mid 1800s because of the potato famine, were successful in establishing their own business. Two were bakers (everyone has to eat), three owned hotels (everyone has to have a roof over their heads), and one owned a hardware store (everyone has to repair stuff).
Of course other factors come into play, like access to capital, ability to take risks, and in exercising many of the basic rules of life penned by Peterson.
Exactly. And if your ancestors were to get rich off of hotels, that means a lot of people consensually transacted with that hotel because it made their experience better.
To tie this back to Peterson I was watching a video of his where he talked about the pradeau (sp?) distribution of certain populations. According to him it's a distinct sociological phenomenon that in any group 10% of the population will produce 50% of the output. Doesn't matter if it's lawyers, geologists or farmers. That 10% is selected for by natural aptitude, and it benefits the whole population because without that 50% everyone would suffer. That was one of the contributing factors in the Ukrainian famine in the 1930s, the Bolsheviks punished the 10% successful farmers because they were idealougues who were certain that these people had cheated or stolen from the less successful farmers. The result was a dip in food production of 50% and mass starvation.
It's pretty hard to make it to the top on money and connections alone. What money and connections do provide is a higher floor. And this isn't just the extreme wealthy that secure their status, but the upper middle-class, the 20 per cent. They can't ensure their children reach the top, but by providing security, education, and connections, they make it extremely unlikely that they'll drop out of top 20-30 per cent.
To tie this back to Peterson I was watching a video of his where he talked about the pradeau (sp?) distribution of certain populations. According to him it's a distinct sociological phenomenon that in any group 10% of the population will produce 50% of the output. Doesn't matter if it's lawyers, geologists or farmers. That 10% is selected for by natural aptitude, and it benefits the whole population because without that 50% everyone would suffer.
Those 10 per cent used to be widely distributed in communities all over the place. The doctors, lawyers, and successful small business owners in a town or small city. They're make up the civic leadership, chair the local charities, head up the clubs and associations that used to knit communities together. They'd be the leaders, examples of high achievement. And their kids would be distributed across all the schools in a region. So every school would have a core of engaged students and parents.
Today, high achievers have abandoned smaller communities and declining neighbourhoods, and now cluster in much larger communities made up almost entirely of high-achievers. They've helped create vibrant pockets of innovation and affluence. But they've left declining communities bereft of leadership and energy. Now we have entire schools full of engaged and ambitious kids, and entire schools full of those left behind.
In that sense, the 10 per cent are no longer benefiting the rest of society the way they used to, at the grass roots level of engagement in economically diverse communities.
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Originally Posted by fotze
If this day gets you riled up, you obviously aren't numb to the disappointment yet to be a real fan.
I, like every from every person from every past generation, have been hearing that "life isn't fair" all my life. It may sound a little silly, but this millennial is just finally getting around to fully understand what that means, and to truly accept that.
I don't know whether to blame (which I am now using that word ironically) my upbringing, schooling, the kids television programming, or our greater Canadian society as a whole, but thinking back I sort of misunderstood "Life isn't fair" to mean "There will be challenges and adversity to overcome, but all will be right in the end if you work hard, believe in yourself, etc. etc. Bad guys always get their comeuppance and good guys always win in the end". All that hokey ####.
Finally, and with no hint on jadedness or nihilism, I am coming to around to accepting that no, not everything can be made perfectly right. It isn't one perspective on life, it's the facts, and any other view is a delusion. Again, this might sound a little silly to some, but there is a subtlety there that I'm just finally understanding and accepting, a little later in life than some. And that isn't to say we shouldn't stand up for what's right, and fight against injustice. We just have to be sure the fight is truly worth spending some of our short lives on.
I see it as a good thing if the self-improvement doctrine of Jordan Peterson reaches more young people. I'm not sure if anything he says is novel, but he has the platform now, and his "rules" seem to a have positive message and positive influence on a lot of people. Peterson's self-improvement message can be distilled as "life isn't fair, so work hard at making yourself a better person, and if everyone works on themselves this way, life can be a little better for everyone" (again...not exactly novel). There is no perfection or utopia to achieve, just lower levels of suffering. And it's not that this is good or bad, it just is, so we have to accept it. I wish I intuitively understood this when I was younger.
One of my most favorite quotes ever is one that applies here:
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The 80/20 is often often generalized and applied incorrectly. The farming example is one such case. By punishing the most successful everyone cut back on effort not just the 10% which led to the large drop in output. The 80/20 rule implies that the top 20% are 16 times more efficient than the average of the rest of the 80%. It's just not true. The 80/20 rule does have applications in taxation, HSE, Crime, Wealth generation but not output of labour.
But I think the concept of the best 20% leading to wealth generation and Cliffs point about those 10-20% benefiting society is important. I think the question them is how does society maximize the conversion rate of children who have the highest potential in beimgnin that 20%. This leads me back to the Hockey Birthday example. Canada probably loses about 30% of its second line NHL calibur wingers so to the birth day cut offs. The top guys regardless of birthday, make it becuase they are elite but the mid pack NHLers are lost because they are beaten out when they are 8-12 for spots on the good teams by kids who are older than them. So we only end up delveoping a portion of the available talent. This conversion rate is one measure of the efficiency our Hockey development.
So when you apply that to structuring a society the question should be asked how good are we at converting those with potential to be in that top 20% to people who are in thatbtop 20%. The answer I think is we are terrible at it. Now there is definately a genetic component where people with unsuccessful parents are less of a genetic fit with society but given how poor class mobility is the structure of society has to be playing a major factor in the poor conversion rate.
So this is where the identarians have a valid point. If you see differing outcomes based on groups, and when accounting for economic factors, Race, gender, etc find a trait that is under performing the cause is either genetic or structural. So blaming the "Patriarchy" is reasonable. Is it the cause of everything? Of course not. Do class issues play a role in addition to race and gender? Of
Course and to a much greater degree then many identarians would admit. That does not mean that the structure of our society leads to a poor conversion rate of potentially successful people in disadvantaged communities.
Also because I love this graphic from the upshot and it sort of applies here it is the class mobility broken down by race and gender in the US. If you get to the end of it there is an option to build your own comparisons within the data.
Is anyone seriously arguing that "non-structural" factors don't or shouldn't play a role?
Try suggesting there are factors besides systemic prejudice responsible for the dire social conditions among the indigenous population in Canada. The taboos around publicly talking about non-structural factors in outcomes will make themselves pretty clear to you.
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Originally Posted by fotze
If this day gets you riled up, you obviously aren't numb to the disappointment yet to be a real fan.
So when you apply that to structuring a society the question should be asked how good are we at converting those with potential to be in that top 20% to people who are in thatbtop 20%. The answer I think is we are terrible at it. Now there is definately a genetic component where people with unsuccessful parents are less of a genetic fit with society but given how poor class mobility is the structure of society has to be playing a major factor in the poor conversion rate.
Canada (and countries like Germany and Japan) are pretty good at it. The U.S. and the UK, not very good. The former have much more social mobility than the latter. So let's recognize that we're doing a lot right.
In Canada, educational attainment tracks to parental income a lot less tightly than it does in the U.S. or UK, because schools are still fairly diverse and egalitarian. Which is why we should be wary of the trend in this country towards American-style self-segregation of schools and school boards by family income. The Fraser Institute's reports contribute to this kind of self-segregation, by encouraging the bright, ambitious, and affluent to all send their kids to the same best schools.
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Originally Posted by fotze
If this day gets you riled up, you obviously aren't numb to the disappointment yet to be a real fan.
Try suggesting there are factors besides systemic prejudice responsible for the dire social conditions among the indigenous population in Canada. The taboos around publicly talking about non-structural factors in outcomes will make themselves pretty clear to you.
There’s definitely taboos around it, but I also think it’s part of how “debate” has evolved on the internet. You see it from both sides of any issue, “You said ____, which is consistent with my perception of people who think ____, so you think ____.”
Not a positive think, definitely, makes things more difficult to navigate.
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Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
Canada (and countries like Germany and Japan) are pretty good at it. The U.S. and the UK, not very good. The former have much more social mobility than the latter. So let's recognize that we're doing a lot right.
In Canada, educational attainment tracks to parental income a lot less tightly than it does in the U.S. or UK, because schools are still fairly diverse and egalitarian. Which is why we should be wary of the trend in this country towards American-style self-segregation of schools and school boards by family income. The Fraser Institute's reports contribute to this kind of self-segregation, by encouraging the bright, ambitious, and affluent to all send their kids to the same best schools.
I think that’s a big part of the conversations being had. America is our biggest influence, and it’s a very very dangerous and negative influence when it comes to social and economic issues. Education, the welfare state and social issues in general, environmental protection, etc, all things that we are ahead of America on yet at risk of moving backwards on if politicians start trying to mimick south of the border.
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Try suggesting there are factors besides systemic prejudice responsible for the dire social conditions among the indigenous population in Canada. The taboos around publicly talking about non-structural factors in outcomes will make themselves pretty clear to you.
Our gender pay gap: Let's face it, it's not about discrimination
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A January 2018 Stanford University study on gender and the gig economy, analyzing close to two million Uber drivers, who were selected for rides based on algorithms unrelated to gender, still found a seven per cent gender wage gap. Half of that related to male drivers working longer hours. The other half (and who will be surprised by this?) related to the fact that males, on average, were driving faster, thereby getting to their destinations quicker and being available to pick up their next customer.
Another study issued the same month from the National Bureau of Economic Research, based on Danish data, found that almost all of the difference in wages between Danish men and women were the result of women having children. Despite 52-week paid leaves and government-subsidized daycare, the study found that the arrival of children resulted in a long-term wage gap of 20 per cent. Over the 23 years of this study, other sources of the wage gap in Denmark had been almost eliminated but the “child penalty” stubbornly persisted. As in Denmark, North American studies have found there to be effectively no wage gap between men and women who have not had children. So is the gender wage gap actually based on gender?
Should government have forced her employer to pay her as much as it did her male colleagues working longer hours? If it did, would those male lawyers have continued to work as hard? Of greater significance, if government forced employers to pay women who choose to work 9 to 5 in order to spend time with their children the same as lawyers who spend most dinners and weekend lunches at their desks, how likely would employers be to hire women of childbearing age or with young children?
As American Enterprise Institute’s Kay Hymowitz poignantly noted, after reviewing the Uber and Danish studies: “Feminists have long promised that stronger social policies would bring about gender equality. On the evidence of (this) Danish study and similar ones, they do not. The average woman cuts back when her kids are born, regardless of whether the government offers long-term paid leave or heavily subsidized childcare. Taken together, the Uber and Danish studies provide more insight into the reality of male and female wage differences, differences that the practitioners of outrage theatre — from the U.K.’s gender gap reporting legislation to America’s Equal Pay Day — do their best to evade.”
We currently have a government that actively rallies people against the "gender pay gap" and it has no basis in fact. The Liberal convention in April was an absolute embarrassment for this country.
I'm interested to see the results of Mandatory Paternaty leave on the child penalty. I believe Finland, it could be Sweden though, is forcing fathers and mothers to take a portion of the paternaty leave.
Whether this is a societal good or a ridiculous intervention by the state is a separate discussion but the results will be quite interesting
We currently have a government that actively rallies people against the "gender pay gap" and it has no basis in fact. The Liberal convention in April was an absolute embarrassment for this country.
It's a kind of populism of the left. Any policy expert who understands statistics knows the gap is almost entirely about choices families make over child care and work-life balance. And yet politicians portray it as an issue of discrimination and systemic oppression. That's demagoguery, pure and simple. And it's frankly patronizing to women in its assumption that they don't understand statistics, or recognize why the disparity really exists. The decision of a mother to ease off her career in order to devote herself more to family life is only a problem for society if its not a choice entered into freely. And women like my wife deeply resent the stance of hardline feminists and the federal Liberals that it's a public duty to encourage women to spend more hours working outside the home. She doesn't want to.
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Originally Posted by fotze
If this day gets you riled up, you obviously aren't numb to the disappointment yet to be a real fan.
Last edited by CliffFletcher; 05-11-2018 at 11:21 AM.
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