Marching with Morons

The old expression goes: "The rich get richer, the poor get children". This is the basic premise of the story of similar name, and something which has been considered as a potential problem off and on for years. The premise is that the collective IQ of the population is lowered by only the least gifted having children. It is important to note that anything I have to say about that is anecdotal at best, as I have not made any actual study of demographic IQ trends.

What triggered me writing about this was an article in the Times Higher Education online about attempts to open up "elite" universities to the average Nigel:

'The issue at stake is a familiar one: the make-up of the student
population does not reflect that of the UK as a whole. People from some
groups - most notably poorer backgrounds - are significantly
under-represented in the university system.

According to a 2008 National Audit Office (NAO) report, Widening
Participation in Higher Education, half the population of England is
made up of people from lower socio-economic groups, yet among the young
full-time student population the proportion is less than a third (29 per
cent). Those from better-off backgrounds are more than twice as likely
to go to university as those from the less privileged sections of
society.

But getting to university is only the first part of the equation: the
second is the type of university these students attend. Poorer students
are more likely to study at "lower status", less selective institutions,
and this affects their life chances. The divide is widest in "elite"
universities, particularly Oxbridge - a high-profile issue regularly in
the public eye. It is here that widening participation collides with
"fair access".'

Granted, this doesn't have a lot to do with the book I mentioned above, but there is a bit of stupidity involved. This cannot be any sort of surprise; the definition of the word "elite" would do for starters. The article then goes on to burnish its' brilliance with something about how it actually matters which University you graduate from. To take a couple of domestic examples, the degree from Queens' carries a bit more weight in the marketplace than one from, say, Lakehead, all things being equal. This is not to slag Lakehead or to say that Queens' is the bees'-knees, but some are more prestigious than others. "Better" is a more complex idea requiring quantifiable direct comparisons, but prestige although nebulous is easier to get a feel for.

Where this comes back on track is with the effect of successfully integrating Joe and Jane six-pack (or the Brit equivalent; football hooligans, mayhap?) into Oxford and Cambridge. There could be some short-term boost to the "outcomes" for those plebes in the labour market ("Ooh! Oxford!"), but in the medium to long-term it turns those former "elite" universities into just another community access college. This is a typical political decision, looking only as far as the next election and how to get votes from certain segments of the hoi-polloi. Demographics are Destiny, but a pig with lipstick is still a pig.

If you're poor and want to go to a fancy school, there are mechanisms for that known as "scholarships". This keeps the elite character of the school, in fact enhances it, as it brings in the best and brightest, not just the kids whose parents are wealthy and well-connected enough to get them in. Of course this is (gasp!) an argument for a meritocracy. The politically correct will not accept that as the basis for society, as it is too "exclusionary".

I want people smarter than me running certain things, certainly anything that involves a lot of math. Most people don't resent people more intelligent than themselves, (as long as their noses aren't rubbed in it) and can appreciate that not everybody can do everything equally well, or on some cases, at all. It's rather like arguments to keep the Olympics more open to less-than-elite athletes; I don't care to watch anyone competing in something that they aren't not in the very top rank of; consider women's hockey from the recent games. Most people can play hockey (for example) worse than pros, so they watch pros to see it at the highest (available) level.

"Equality" and "access" when combined should not (and literally don't) mean that everyone can do whatever they feel like whether or not they have the means (personal or material) to do so. The government is an institution designed to keep the lights on and the worst excesses of human nature under control. It has everywhere grown far beyond that, and although I like our medical system, I'm not fool enough to think that it comes for "free". The laws of Thermodynamics dictate that you don't get something for nothing, and it applies in the practical "real world" as well. Of course governments exist to control the population; as an exception, the U.S. Constitution took a stab at keeping government small and out of most of peoples' lives 200+ years ago, but now they have "No Child Left Behind", which (thank you, Law of Unintended
Consequences) is more like "No Child Gets Ahead". Cue Harrison Bergeron.


This is the real risk to our societies, not poor people having more kids than rich people. Poor kids can still be smart, and with WELL CONSIDERED incentives they can and should get ahead. Anything that doesn't involve taking an opportunity from someone else who would otherwise have it is fair game in my books.

Entitlement is a cancer eating away at Western civilization, but we'll see more attempts to impose it on the taxpayers until our system collapses. That is, assuming it hasn't already in some places; Greece is pretty much paralyzed with strikes and protests, and the Euro zone is in real trouble. One thing I can tell you with certainty is that Brussels won't be able to do more than paper over this, if it can do even that. More regulation will be their answer to this, not "live within your means".

As soon as people think that others will bail them out, they are no longer interested in being prudent. At a personal level that's welfare, or being handed a university placement that you didn't earn by brains or bank account. Back on the education angle, 50% of the population is BY DEFINITION below Average. No government initiative will change that; in fact no power on Earth can, and any ideas to the contrary are at best delusional. The US Army's ads from a few years back had it right: Be All That You Can Be. I don't live in "happy-self-esteem world" and out here everyone has limited potential, like it or not. You can push that potential to see how far you can go, but you can't be pulled there.