How Meritocracy Worsens Inequality—and Makes Even the Rich Miserable
In his book The Meritocracy Trap, Yale Law School’s Daniel Markovits argues that rather than democratizing American society, meritocracy has contributed to increasing inequality and the decline of the middle class. We asked him what it would take to create a society with opportunities for more Americans.
In the middle of the 20th century, American institutions embraced the idea of meritocracy. Top universities, and the banks and law firms they fed, which had been populated by a hereditary aristocracy, instead sought the smartest and hardest working. But while the meritocratic system was intended to democratize American society, argues Yale Law School’s Daniel Markovits in his book The Meritocracy Trap, it has instead contributed to increasing inequality and the decline of the middle class.
“Although meritocracy was embraced as the handmaiden of equality, and did open up the elite in its early years, it now more nearly stifles rather than fosters social mobility,” he writes. “The avenues that once carried people from modest circumstances into the American elite are narrowing dramatically. Middle-class families cannot afford the elaborate schooling that rich families buy, and ordinary schools lag farther and farther behind elite ones.”
