Galston Goes From Blah to Reprehensible
William Galston, the WSJ's token liberal columnist, has finally eased into his role and is now comfortable to be more than merely innocuously anodyne. In today's column he let's loose. He rails against the horrible vision that evil conservatives have for America - meritocracy.
And it's a horrible misfire in many respects. First, the obvious one, is that Galston laments the default state of mankind. Societies in which exceptional and educated people do much better than the average and much much better than the low-skilled and uneducated have been the norm throughout time across most of the globe, with the notable exception of post-war, rapidly modernizing America. Galston, like most liberals, laments that the world has changed from basically the age of the automobile in the 1950s and 60s. Furthermore, the alternatives to "meritocracy" are undesirable, but we wouldn't know what alternatives Galston would prefer because he doesn't tell us.
A second misfire is his talisman for the new, awful conservo-slavery, George Mason economist Tyler Cowen. Cowen is an enigmatic, somewhat quasi-libertarian economist, who, after reading him for years, I still can't quite pin down politically. One thing I do know, is that the last way I would characterize Cowen is conservative.
Finally, Galston's biggest misfire is mistaking Cowen's actual argument, mistaking what is presented as likely for what is desirable. Cowen's "Average Is Over" is not instructional but descriptive of a much-discussed economic phenomenon, the increasing returns to intellectual capital and exceptional skills that many believe is the source of increasing income inequality. This is hardly Cowen's idea, let alone a vision. Nassim Taleb's The Black Swan discusses this colorfully using the metaphorical locales of Extremeistan and Mediocristan. All the theory states is that, in our increasingly globalized, information-driven economy, better educated and talented people are able to thrive more and capture greater economic returns (income and wealth). The increasing value of information delivers outsized rewards to people who can process and make use of information. This is as opposed to an economy which places the most value on production and delivers outsized rewards to those who can produce, i.e. specialized factory workers. This is what is happening. I am pretty sure that Cowen does not say that this is desirable, although he may not say that this is despicable. Galston clearly thinks it is.
But Galston misses a much bigger point, and this is what I think is despicable. Galston and his ilk have contributed to consigning the losers to the Shantytown America that he laments. By running the public education system into the ground with blind loyalty to unionism, dumbed-down standards, and tolerance of truancy, liberals have consigned millions to the margins of a changing and complex economy. By advocating the unrestrained immigration of people into a society for which they are ill-prepared to navigate even the basic demands of daily life, Galston's side piles more humanity into the America that he doesn't want to live in. And by relentlessly undermining the family and religious community, liberals have weakened the social arrangements and values that are known advantages for economic well-being.
I bristle at the arrogance and the gall of people like Galston who cast aspersions, false aspersions even, on people like Cowen who describe the world as it is, a world that has left behind millions who languish mostly due to the false promises of the leftist vision of society.
And it's a horrible misfire in many respects. First, the obvious one, is that Galston laments the default state of mankind. Societies in which exceptional and educated people do much better than the average and much much better than the low-skilled and uneducated have been the norm throughout time across most of the globe, with the notable exception of post-war, rapidly modernizing America. Galston, like most liberals, laments that the world has changed from basically the age of the automobile in the 1950s and 60s. Furthermore, the alternatives to "meritocracy" are undesirable, but we wouldn't know what alternatives Galston would prefer because he doesn't tell us.
A second misfire is his talisman for the new, awful conservo-slavery, George Mason economist Tyler Cowen. Cowen is an enigmatic, somewhat quasi-libertarian economist, who, after reading him for years, I still can't quite pin down politically. One thing I do know, is that the last way I would characterize Cowen is conservative.
Finally, Galston's biggest misfire is mistaking Cowen's actual argument, mistaking what is presented as likely for what is desirable. Cowen's "Average Is Over" is not instructional but descriptive of a much-discussed economic phenomenon, the increasing returns to intellectual capital and exceptional skills that many believe is the source of increasing income inequality. This is hardly Cowen's idea, let alone a vision. Nassim Taleb's The Black Swan discusses this colorfully using the metaphorical locales of Extremeistan and Mediocristan. All the theory states is that, in our increasingly globalized, information-driven economy, better educated and talented people are able to thrive more and capture greater economic returns (income and wealth). The increasing value of information delivers outsized rewards to people who can process and make use of information. This is as opposed to an economy which places the most value on production and delivers outsized rewards to those who can produce, i.e. specialized factory workers. This is what is happening. I am pretty sure that Cowen does not say that this is desirable, although he may not say that this is despicable. Galston clearly thinks it is.
But Galston misses a much bigger point, and this is what I think is despicable. Galston and his ilk have contributed to consigning the losers to the Shantytown America that he laments. By running the public education system into the ground with blind loyalty to unionism, dumbed-down standards, and tolerance of truancy, liberals have consigned millions to the margins of a changing and complex economy. By advocating the unrestrained immigration of people into a society for which they are ill-prepared to navigate even the basic demands of daily life, Galston's side piles more humanity into the America that he doesn't want to live in. And by relentlessly undermining the family and religious community, liberals have weakened the social arrangements and values that are known advantages for economic well-being.
I bristle at the arrogance and the gall of people like Galston who cast aspersions, false aspersions even, on people like Cowen who describe the world as it is, a world that has left behind millions who languish mostly due to the false promises of the leftist vision of society.
posted by Donny Baseball at 10:02 AM
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