Making the Rich and Powerful Work for Everyone
The philosopher John Rawls suggested that the only ethical society is one which we design before we know what position we will hold in it. If you don’t know whether you’ll be born the child of janitor or a billionaire, black or white, you may view social justice differently than when you know that your parents both went to Harvard or Oxford.
Rawls’s point is just in the sense that though none of us choose our parents, very few of us are able to see the world except through our own eyes. What I am going to suggest is something different: A society works best if it treats people the same, no matter what position they hold. This is hardly a new position. The idea that everyone should be treated equally is ancient and many a war has been fought over it. But despite a fair bit of progress, we don’t really understand what equality means, how it works, and why it works.
Let’s have an example. Based on international testing, at the time of this writing, the Finnish education system is arguably the best in the world. Its students do better than those of any other nation.
What is interesting about the Finnish school system, though, is this: When they decided to change how it worked, they did not set out to try and make it the best in the world. Instead their goal was to make it so that everyone was treated the same. Their goal was not excellence, their goal was equality. Somehow, along the way, and very much to their surprise, it also became arguably the best school system in the world.
There are a number of reasons for this, the main one being a well-established fact: People who are treated as lesser don’t perform as well and are less healthy–even after you take into account other factors.
But another reason is that if you are rich or powerful, you can’t buy your child a better education. Testing results between schools are not made public and the very few private schools are not allowed to use selective admissions. In a system where your child will be treated the same as every other child, you must make sure that every child receives an excellent education, otherwise your child may not receive one.
Let’s engage in another thought experiment. In the United States, airport security is extremely intrusive. Recently, new procedures for physical examinations were put in place which include touching the genitals (I’ve personally experienced it and it definitely included genital contact, albeit with my clothing on.) Most security experts consider this to be security theatre, along with such things as taking your shoes off and the new 3D scanners. They believe that the two most important improvements in airline security were locked cockpit doors and passengers knowing that if they remain passive and allow hijacking, they could all wind up dead.
Coincidentally, the 2000s have seen an explosion in the use of private jets. The most powerful, rich, and important people no longer fly on the same airplanes as the hoi polloi and, as a result, they do not go through the same security screenings.
Do you think that if the most important people in America had to endure the same security as ordinary Americans that it would be as intrusive as it is? How many billionaires would have to be groped before something was done?
While we’re on the subject of private jets, consider the following: A private jet still has to use a runway. If a private jet is using the same public airport you are, it takes up a take-off or landing slot. Next time you’re waiting for a take-off slot, or wondering why your flight is delayed, think on that. Less than ten people on a private jet are holding up over a hundred people on a passenger jet.
No part of society will continue to work properly if the powerful and rich have no interest in its doing so. There are three parts to this:
- If there is a public system, there cannot also be a private system which can be used to opt out of the public system.
- If there are limited resources, whether those are airplane flight slots at airports or medical care, then no one can be allowed to use either wealth or power to jump the queue, nor must they be allowed to use more resources than those without power or money.
- Any part of the economy where there is a monopoly or an oligopoly must either be publicly run or must be heavily regulated for quality, level of profits, and reinvestment.
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The success of Finland’s educational system has a lot less to do with equality of access (though important) than it does with their extremely rigorous program of teacher selection and training, which has very deep historical roots.
Finland is a small homogeneous xenophobic country. I’d be more impressed if the results came from a multiracial country.
This is an interesting article (in French) about racism in Finland:
http://rue89.nouvelobs.com/2013/01/03/finlande-umayya-limmigree-qui-tend-un-miroir-au-racisme-238287
What can we learn from Finland?
“Trust” declines with diversity, according to Robert D. Putnam’s research
Has any state in history achieved all three of diversity, equality, and freedom? The West used to have a lot of equality and freedom, but with its elites having been committed to diversity uber alles for decades, we get ever less of them.
Also, in comparing the PISA rankings one might want to factor in the racial composition of countries. The US is mediocre in its overall ranking, but not so bad when you consider that white Americans outscored every white country except Finland; and Asian-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and African-Americans outscored every Asian, Latin American, and African country respectively.
Obviously I still agree with the main point of the post — elites should have to eat their own dog food.
Ian said “If there is a public system, there cannot also be a private system which can be used to opt out of the public system.”
I agree. I.E., no private schools, no private health care, no private roads, no private jets. Everybody in, nobody out.
Toronto had both in the late 20th century, as did Vancouver. Canada’s main social democratic party at the time, the NDP, was also its main “diversity” party. I think the distinguishing factor might be the ruthless assimilationism of American society which tends to create a lot of pent-up hostility beneath the uniform front it presents.
Wait a minute — the NSA doesn’t screen private jets and their passengers? They just come and go as they please? And no-one thinks this might, possibly, be a problem? That a wealthy interest, or a skilled hijacker, would never decide to take out the whole chain of command of the USA on Inauguration Day, leaving an interesting power vacuum?
I have given up saying, “Oh surely they would never do THAT,” because generally they do, with bells on. But …
Noni
Why do we wring our hands and wonder how Finland could have a superior school system?
DUH… because the Fins are superior people???
I live in New Mexico. Yes, we have multi culturalism. And to a certain extent – things are peaceful here. Latinos are easy to love.. their music, food and culture are unassuming and easy to live with. But make no mistake.. there is a huge difference between Latino kids and whites. And the Navajos are way behind even the Latinos.
Ij am 68 years old. I”ve lived and traveled the world. NO – we are not all equal. And I’m sick to death of being told the differences are in my imagination. They are right there to see, if one has eyes to see. The Bell Curve and it’s implications are all around us.. and it is wonderful when minorities achieve better.
But stop telling me we are all the same… WE most certainly are NOT!
Well, that last comment kind of sucked. Not only does he suggest “differences” are race-based, he raises the loathsome Bell Curve to support his prejudices.
The point Ian is making is not that every individual is equal in talents, ability or achievement, but that a healthy society will strive to make their access to vital common resources as equal as possible. Think local taxes unequally funding schools; think how awful access for the poors is for everything, denying us equal participation as citizens of a commonweal. Don’t get started on that idiotic shibboleth of “opportunity” vs “outcomes.” The opportunities suck. The outcomes suck. The hardest-working people in every country are the poor.
Don’t. Ever. Forget. It.
Oh yes, latino culture is so…unassuming. And fiery, too! But the Navajos are way behind. Cretin.
The way things should be, and always should have been
…but also how they will never be.
People are too xenophobic and fascist by nature.
There will ALWAYS be those who are considered (and treated as) “lessers”.
I disagree with the previous comment: people are not too xenophobic or fascist by nature. Such behavior is learned. Taught by people who stand to gain by inciting division. It’s one of the oldest scams in the book: get two other people to fight and, while they’re rolling around in the dirt, grab both of their wallets.
If you don’t spend all day putting people into little cubby holes and telling them that the people in the other cubby holes are their enemies, if you don’t spend all day telling those people that everything is more scarce than it actually is (or creating actual scarcities where there were none), and if you don’t spend all day nursing their grievances, those people are not going to grow up to be xenophobic fascists.
Goodness. What comments!
First and foremost, we are all humans. (Not Newberry. He’s a robot)
Second, we have subsets among us: tall, short, intelligent, dumb, pretty, pretty ugly, fast, slow, etc.
We are born into these subsets.
All the other subsets that we create, which are always self serving , are just that, man made.
Do yourself a favor and judge the person next to you by his/her God given talents or shortcomings. It’ll save you a lot of Grief.
“Judging people by their talents” is a big problem in this society, because it most often comes down to judging their social (read class) position; their wealth, status, edumacation, job, house, wife, sort-of-intelligence, instead of character. And then there are those with average, not stellar, character. But they must have a place.
We have got to move towards a society that recognizes and accounts for people who are not the smartest in the room, who are unambitious (praise Jesus), who are old or sick or work as waiters and home-care attendants (seriously, you’ll need one) or bakers or barbers.
When the only people in a society who can live decent lives, have security of health, food, housing and education are the elite, in our case bankers, lobbyists and arms dealers, we have a problem.