Beware of the new elites
The revolving door hints at the larger problem. The United States is supposed to be a land of opportunity, where everyone can pursue their dreams. Throughout our history, many have started with nothing and risen to the top. But those on top today are busy rewriting the rules to limit entry into their club.
In her recent Daily Beast column, “America’s New Mandarins,” Megan McArdle describes a new elite that rates education credentials more highly than any other skills. In this world, having a Harvard diploma means more than being willing to work hard or contributing something of value. Most Americans don’t share this view. Only 3 percent believe Ivy League schools produce better workers.
Given a choice between a worker who gets more done and someone who has a higher level of education, only 9 percent think the person with the higher level of education should be paid more. Seventy-one percent place a higher value on the person who gets more done.
In the New Mandarin world described by McArdle, the best jobs are reserved for those who attended the most prestigious schools. Entry into such schools is restricted to those with wealth and connections. The rest of us are expected to trust the elites to decide what’s fair.
Blowback
Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.
Trackbacks/Pings
Trackback URL
Comments
Yet all those people pulled the lever for a Dog Eater whose resume was completely devoid of any skills necessary for the job. Then they did it again 4 years later and made sure he was accompanied by a race-pandering white hag who would have a tough time figuring out how to start a lawnmower.
Bishop on March 18, 2013 at 9:54 PM
… and they want a steady supply of illegals to clean their homes and pools and drive them to and from their US Capitol, gummint department buildings and Executive Office Building offices when not high living their day on taxpayer provided expense accounts at top dollar restaurants, Congressional Country Club and otherwise loafing about.
viking01 on March 18, 2013 at 9:57 PM
Bush is stupid and got his degrees because of who his daddy is, but yet this corrupt institution that hands out degrees based on lineage is proof that obozo is, like, super smart.
Flange on March 18, 2013 at 9:58 PM
Rasmussen’s argument is at least 34 years old.
David Lebedoff, a Minnesota lawyer, wrote an article in Esquire about this in the late 1970s. He later developed it into a full-length book, “The New Elite”.
(NOTE TO ED: Hinderaker and Johnson know him well.)
He nailed it even then.
If you can find it, I urge you to read it.
either orr on March 18, 2013 at 10:05 PM
i.e the RNC and GOPE that is after all what the whole ROve SPAC is all about. And the changes proposed at the convention and at CPAC…
unseen on March 18, 2013 at 10:05 PM
Higher level of education?
Barky has Columbia and Harvard diplomas and he’s still mind-numbingly stupid – “profit AND earnings ratios”, “reduce premiums by 3000%!”, “I don’t know if you have this expression in Austrian …”
A Harvard diploma is a serious black mark in my book. It has nothing to do with education as Harvard is happy to pass through the dumbest people around if they are taken as school pets or their families give large sums of money.
ThePrimordialOrderedPair on March 18, 2013 at 10:06 PM
Barky was also Precedent of the Lawn Review but he can’t write edit decent English for his pathetic life. The guy has an 84 IQ and didn’t break 920 on his SATs. His diplomas are jokes and the institutions that granted them are jokes, too.
ThePrimordialOrderedPair on March 18, 2013 at 10:08 PM
Yup, it’s a sick system. Note that the most elite institutions are based in New England who were the victors.
Punchenko on March 18, 2013 at 10:09 PM
the very concept of an elite class goes against everything that the nation stands for.
Capitalism doesn’t work unless there is a complete cycle of rags to riches and riches to rags.
bernie Madoff and his entire family should be on the street corner begging for spare change. So should every CEO of every bank that needed a bailout so should every CEO of the american auto companies. these men and women destoryed their companies and yet were left wealthy people.
Its a disgrace..
And not just business owners who destoryed their companies but all these politicians who have steered this country into the crapper like bush Clinton Obama the McCains kennedy’s all should be on the street begging for food to eat.
There aren’t elites they are a disgrace.
unseen on March 18, 2013 at 10:11 PM
the longer this goes on the more likely the revolt will match France’s instead of America’s
unseen on March 18, 2013 at 10:12 PM
There is nothing new about elites wanting to rule the world.
SirGawain on March 18, 2013 at 10:13 PM
Bush at least was able to keep an F-102 in the air successfully. Keeping fighter aircraft aloft requires split-second thinking on an aeronautical engineering level. Particularly in the days when turbine failures, flameouts and other reliability shortcomings were common. So while I may disagree with several of GWB’s decisions bloating our government he does have a good head on his shoulders.
viking01 on March 18, 2013 at 10:21 PM
Mexico knows all about an elite class. I can’t think of a better way for this group to consolidate power than grant amnesty to 15 million illegal aliens.
Wigglesworth on March 18, 2013 at 10:23 PM
In my experience, Ive League schools produce snot-nosed know-it-alls who don’t have the sense God gave a potato.
You spend the first few months proving to them how ignorant they are of the real world, then the next several months retraining them.
CurtZHP on March 18, 2013 at 10:28 PM
So be it. A whole lot of cleaning needs to take place anyway.
Myron Falwell on March 18, 2013 at 10:40 PM
The GOP will betray you. Now more than ever.
Myron Falwell on March 18, 2013 at 10:42 PM
Isn’t this the textbook description of Progressivism? Been happening for a while.
NavyMustang on March 19, 2013 at 2:41 AM
Or to those with the right skin color, last name, gender, sexual proclivity.
AcidReflux on March 19, 2013 at 6:18 AM
Lately, I’ve been thinking that they just keep misspelling effete.
Fallon on March 19, 2013 at 8:20 AM
It’s interesting how the left was so outrageously outraged by the fact that Bush Jr., got the benefit of a legacy boost to his Yale admission (because his father had gone to Yale), but they didn’t seem to mind a bit that Obama Jr. got the benefit of both a legacy boost to his Harvard admission (because his father had gone to Harvard), as well as an Aff*rmative Act*on boost.
AZCoyote on March 19, 2013 at 9:42 AM
I don’t know look how screwed up france has been for the last 300 years.
I think the marxists welcome a france type of revolution. I would rather have another 1776 awakening. But the more the elites try to crush opposition and control the levers of power the worse the blow up will be when it happens. and it always happens. The entire Arab “spring” is because of this type of thinking.
unseen on March 19, 2013 at 10:18 AM