David S. wrote:
Raghu asks what I think.
I think there is a meritocratic class that distinguishes itself from those
not in the meritocratic class, and it has almost nothing to do with
economics or family connections.
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For this to be so, you'd have to establish that women, blacks, Hispanics,
and those from working-class families were proportionately represented at
the highest levels of government and the private sector. This is nowhere
near being the case.
While the spread of mass education has made it more possible than in
previous generations for exceptional women and children of poor and minority
families to enter the ruling class, the barriers are still higher than for
white males from wealthy backgrounds.
As has probably been pointed out already in this discussion, the current
President of the United States does not belong to a "meritocracy", and while
his may be an extreme case, it does provide a vivid illustration of the
continuing relationship of wealth to power.
