It's far from perfect, but the 'special case' you describe is actually rare.
There are people who are brilliant and hardworking in the academic sense slinging coffee for life, because both those attributes will result in 'good grades' which is a really good proxy for other things in life.
Do you have a specific example where it seemed to work fine for you?
(The example where I learned was in diverse web communities, including Wikimedia.)
Next time you are at the office, look to your left, look to your right: you will notice conscientious people, probably educated, probably reasonably hard working, team work oriented, and probably bright.
Then hop on the bus and have conversations with the 'average person'. You fill find somewhat less conscientious, less interested, less curious, less intelligent people.
We have very clearly and unambiguously a mostly meritocratic system: as you go from coffee maker, to skilled labourer, to creative worker, to middle management to executive, you'll see a pretty obvious trend.
It's funny how the meritocratic naysayers, probably already in the top 20% of income earnings, probably would believer firmly they are more 'deserving' of their job than the dude who drove them there on the bus, but that somehow, the system 'above them' is 'not meritocratic'.
The issue then becomes one of 'self awareness': we don't like our boss, we are jealous of others who have more, we see some folks 'skip the line' with better access to education i.e. we see flaws or things 'we don't like' to varying degree and so somehow we believe the system is existentially flawed. It's not.
The first time you start to hire people, it becomes perfectly clear: either 'you' are fundamentally part of that of that byzantine, unfair system, inflicting your woes onto everyone with unfair hiring/advancement - or - more likely, you're actually trying to hire decent candidates, capable of doing the work.
So what's more likely: 1) you are the lone hero in an unfair world, trying to hire 'good people' while everyone else is either dumb or plotting like Mr. Bean a fools dystopia - or 2) that most people are like you, trying to hire reasonably good people (hopefully the best you can) and trying to do a reasonable job - and there is some intelligence in that process.
It's the later.
Most modern systems are crudely meritocratic. When they are not, it's obvious, but that doesn't mean those failures are normative or existential to the system.
Wow, this is jaw-dropping stereotype.
I used to ride the bus, and unsurprisingly, my level of intelligence was completely unaffected by the mode of transportation I happened to be using at the time.
Also, public transportation is more environmentally friendly than everyone driving cars.
Now that I think a little more about it, your comment is interesting because I'm wondering how much empirical experience you have striking up conversations with people on the bus? If you're a frequently bus rider, doesn't that make you, by your own argument, less intelligent?
Personally I experienced the average person when I did my military duty. Most people were forced to attend so you got a good slice of what society looks like. And yes, the average person there wasn't that bright, the discussions I heard there was the dumbest I've ever experienced.
No, that's not how randomness works. If you talk to sufficiently many random people, you will likely get a wide distribution of people.
Besides, talking to strangers is not a good measure, because people are often guarded around strangers. Especially on the bus, I thought people who tried to talk to me out of the blue were a bit strange and to be avoided.
The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense, at least in terms of wage earning potential.
Ironically it would be someone without exposure to the 'bus world' who would have some utopian view that somehow all these bus riders are 'the same as professionals'.
My hunch is that it is white, upper middle class professionals without exposure who have this naive perspective as only entitled people can afford to.
It's pretty obvious riding the bus daily, that on average, that is not the case.
What is 'jaw dropping' is the lack of self awareness int many people seem to have difficulty accepting these simple facts, even if they don't 'feel' very nice.
'The bus' (esp. not the subway) is the domain of the urban working class - full stop.
"is more environmentally friendly" - this is irrelevant to the argument - the question is, why imbue the debate with side-show moralizing?
Those on ballpark equal footing who entered your high-school all had various opportunities in life, those who consistently put their best feet forward (usually measured by better grades but often not), were more consistently likely to have better opportunities. Not always, but usually.
Those who entered the work force and did 'a terrible job' were, by and large - not advanced. Those who did 'a good job' - mostly had more opportunity.
Obviously it's not always the case, but it usually is.
The people going to Medical School, mostly, are really really impressive folks.
The people stocking shelves, while they could be as great as pre-meds, and whatever talents they have are probably under utilized ... are nevertheless not in pre-med generally for good reason: the system is crudely meritocratic.
> The average bus rider is less capable than the average Universality educated white collar tech worker in the professional sense,
You ride the bus. Some university educated white collar tech workers ride the bus. So why even bring up the bus? Denigrating bus riders doesn't help your argument at all, it's a red herring, as is speaking of "average" people, because averages often overlook the wide range of values within the population.
> at least in terms of wage earning potential.
That's not the interesting question here, otherwise "we have a meritocracy" would be almost a tautology.
> 'The bus' (esp. not the subway) is the domain of the urban working class - full stop.
Maybe we shouldn't full stop, but rather talk about the demographics of the urban working class...
> "is more environmentally friendly" - this is irrelevant to the argument - the question is, why imbue the debate with side-show moralizing?
Because riding the bus could be seen as a sign of conscientiousness, education, and intelligence, in contrast to your characterization of bus riders, and refusal to ride the bus as a sign of selfishness and immorality. Personally, I make no generalizations about bus riders. I tended to keep to myself on public transportation and thought it strange when someone wanted to talk to a stranger out of the blue. So it would be very unlikely for anyone to have experienced an intelligent, interesting conversation with me on the bus, regardless of my level of intelligence.
> the system is crudely meritocratic
This is not the defense you think it is. Few think the system is entirely random, or on the other hand, perfect. The level of crudeness is precisely why we're constantly debating the system.
If you are using modern (western) societies as your example; you will see a sophisticated system of laws, subsidies, taxes, education and health investments, etc... which are all at least in part designed to prevent this breakdown and make sure that people who have something to contribute get a chance to contribute to society, and hopefully get justly rewarded.
The counter-intuitive part is that the outcomes are more Merit-based than are possible if you directly institute a merit based system. (It seems that policy outcomes are almost never intuitive)
I am average in a domain but I want competent people around me. I am not against them earning more.
What I see is that some people will consider that any type of competence signaled through usual means (e.g. better pay) is in fact corruption and the reason they earn less. You will find many of those people commenting on this post.
Higher IQ, better academic results correlates with better jobs. That's a very crude, but broad measure of meritocracy.
But it's even easier than that: show me people earning $180K developing software who are 'complete idiots'. They don't exist.
People who earn more are generally smarter, more conscientious, credentialed.
It's basically a ridiculous argument to imply that meritocracy doesn't exist, when it's poignantly the basis of almost everything we do.
You might be smarter and more capable than your boss but more broadly speaking it's not the case.
My observation is that a disproportionate amount of the comments were from people that do not like meritocracy and are irrationally and hysterically going to argue with you missing the point. They will not be converted.
The ones who would know better seem to steer off clear from engaging with incompetent mobs; you will not find them here to have a sane discussion.
Since you're looking only at national scale for now: A good measure for people being rewarded based on merit is social mobility. Which countries do you expect to have better social mobility? Countries that have a strong social-democratic element, or countries that are purely capitalist?
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/ranked-the-social-mobility-...
If you ever decide to try to implement strict Meritocracy at a smaller scale when actually locally organizing your own local organizations, please let me know; I'll bring popcorn. ;)
the point you made earlier of people who dont ever have visibility of the 'other' always sees only from their pov particularly resonated. it is human nature to find joy with what we have. the projection of the privileged class about what the 'other' lacks is more damaging than any other inequality.
it's like someone who is happy with their prius until they saw that they neighbour got a tesla. suddenly, they feel impoverished.
now..what do you call the person who walks around the neighbourhood and keeps telling the prius guy that its unfair that the neighbour who is human just like him has a tesla..and why not him!
we have more people walking around neighbourhoods spouting opinions sowing seeds of discontent these days. but at the end of the day, the prius guy and tesla guy should ignore the shit stirrer and go on with their lives..driving their own cars to get to their desired destinations.