With other variables held constant, a measure of “academic ability” that combined high-school records and SAT test scores was about ten times as important as a measure of “student effort” (study time and so forth), in terms of how much was learned.
Other things equal, a hundred point increase in both the SAT verbal and math scores made a slightly greater difference as to how much more students learned than did the difference between the best and worst instructors in the course.
Students’ ratings of the competence and personability of their teachers had absolutely no relationship with how much the students learned. But the teachers’ grades in graduate school did.
Yep. When we deny the IQ differences, we have to attribute the difference in the outcomes to something else… and schools and teachers seem like a natural choice. Therefore we overestimate the impact of education.
Don’t Make No Waves…Don’t Back No Losers: An Insiders’ Analysis of the Daley Machine (1975)
I couldn’t choose a specific quote, it is all very interesting.
Making the Corps (1997)
The review is interesting, but the part I liked most was this thought at the end:
In fact, [“From each according to his ability, to each according to his need”] sounds pretty nice when taken at face value. For example, this is how families operate: from the parents according to their ability, to the children according to their need. Many insular, highly religious communities also operate this way. In Amish, Mennonite, and Hasidic communities, charitable giving (“alms”) often provides a social safety net for members in need. Some egalitarian hunter-gatherer tribes also functioned like this. And to be honest, it does seem like it would be pretty nice to live in this kind of a community, where everyone looks out for each other.
So what’s going on? Is this kind of “communism” good actually? Libertarians have an easy answer for this – communes are fine if they’re voluntary. As long as nobody’s being violently coerced and people are allowed to leave if they want to, then it’s fine.Alright, so that’s easy but also unsatisfying. Why do people voluntarily participate in these communes, even when it means a net-loss for the most capable and productive members? Why doesn’t the Laffer curve apply to the most productive Amish farmer who has his wealth redistributed to the neediest in the community? Why didn’t the Margaret Thatcher quote about socialists “running out of other people’s money” apply to the most capable hunters in egalitarian hunter-gatherer tribes?
I think the reason why some redistributive systems work and some don’t is related to the psychology of tribalism. A redistributive economic system where everyone views themselves as part of the same tribe and a system in which they view themselves as two tribes [...] are completely different in terms of the psychology of the participants and the ultimate sustainability of the system. The usual critique of wealth redistribution is that it disincentivizes economic production (Laffer curve, Margareth Thatcher quote, etc). But I think this criticism only applies to redistributive systems where the people taking a net-loss and the people taking a net-gain view themselves as two different groups. When they view themselves as part of the same group, as with the Amish or egalitarian hunter-gatherers, then the criticism seems to fall flat, as the most productive members aren’t deterred from working by the net-loss they’re taking.
Explicitly accounting for the one-tribe / two-tribe distinction also helps clear up a lot of debates in political philosophy. [...] The one-tribe democracy is the ideal: a society where people view themselves as all part of the same group, evaluate policies based on what’s best for society as a whole, and then vote based on their individual judgment of what’s best for the group, with this hopefully leading to policies converging on the correct answer. Of course people might disagree about which policies are the best and have heated debates about them, but ultimately the goal is the betterment of the society, and the debate is just over what policies best achieve that goal. On the other hand, in the two-tribe democracy, the goal is simply to vote to take away power, resources, and status from the Out-Group and give them to the In-Group.
This sounds correct to me. I think that an important part is how much I expect other people to reciprocate: not necessarily in this reality, but at least counterfactually (in a hypothetical reality where our roles are reversed). I am okay with doing things for my kids, because I expect them to grow up and do things… not necessarily for me, but further along the line. On the other hand, it would create a tension between me and my partner if we didn’t split our domestic duties in a way that seems fair to both. In other words, I need to see that “each according to one’s abilities” also applies to the others, even if their abilities are different from mine.
The part about needs is trickier, because the needs are potentially unlimited. Also, everyone needs to take a break and relax sometimes, but that means they are not working according to their abilities at the moment. So this all is not necessarily philosophically coherent, but it is still psychologically easier for me to work harder when I believe that everyone else does (even if they are at a different level of ability).
When I see people not doing things, or doing things in a way that makes sure that I will get none of it (for example a clique of people, perhaps hard-working, but making sure they only do things for the other people in the clique), that pisses me off, and then I am also not in the mood to share with them.
I guess, in small groups people punish the ones who don’t do their share (e.g. by refusing to share with them), but in large groups it is difficult to track everyone’s contribution and also to control how the tax money is used. Also, in small groups, if the group pisses you off too much, you can leave and join another group; this is more difficult when the “group” is a country, and leaving means selling your house, learning another language, adapting to a different culture, and there are only a few dozen choices available on the entire planet, and most of them either refuse to accept you or are quite dysfunctional.
Yep. When we deny the IQ differences, we have to attribute the difference in the outcomes to something else… and schools and teachers seem like a natural choice. Therefore we overestimate the impact of education.
I couldn’t choose a specific quote, it is all very interesting.
The review is interesting, but the part I liked most was this thought at the end:
This sounds correct to me. I think that an important part is how much I expect other people to reciprocate: not necessarily in this reality, but at least counterfactually (in a hypothetical reality where our roles are reversed). I am okay with doing things for my kids, because I expect them to grow up and do things… not necessarily for me, but further along the line. On the other hand, it would create a tension between me and my partner if we didn’t split our domestic duties in a way that seems fair to both. In other words, I need to see that “each according to one’s abilities” also applies to the others, even if their abilities are different from mine.
The part about needs is trickier, because the needs are potentially unlimited. Also, everyone needs to take a break and relax sometimes, but that means they are not working according to their abilities at the moment. So this all is not necessarily philosophically coherent, but it is still psychologically easier for me to work harder when I believe that everyone else does (even if they are at a different level of ability).
When I see people not doing things, or doing things in a way that makes sure that I will get none of it (for example a clique of people, perhaps hard-working, but making sure they only do things for the other people in the clique), that pisses me off, and then I am also not in the mood to share with them.
I guess, in small groups people punish the ones who don’t do their share (e.g. by refusing to share with them), but in large groups it is difficult to track everyone’s contribution and also to control how the tax money is used. Also, in small groups, if the group pisses you off too much, you can leave and join another group; this is more difficult when the “group” is a country, and leaving means selling your house, learning another language, adapting to a different culture, and there are only a few dozen choices available on the entire planet, and most of them either refuse to accept you or are quite dysfunctional.