2021-06-17

Meritocracy, democracy and competition

PXL_20210616_102923312 The Tyranny of Merit? refers. This post is just a pointer to John Cochrane's blog Meritocracy, discussing Adrian Woolridge's essay "Meritocracy, Not Democracy, Is the Golden Ticket to Growth," advertising a forthcoming book; all via CH. I largely agree with what JC writes there; in particular that meritocracy has more to do with success than democracy; and continuing to his contention that even more fundamental is competition. And of course, democracy is a form of competition.

Looking at the comments there, "It is more likely that economic growth in all of these countries has had more to do with the success of the private sector than the merit of those who staff their governments" makes sense, in that if you're going to have govt, you need to make sure that it at least doesn't get in the way (non-corrupt); but you also have the option of making it small, which helps.

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