Elite College Admissions Data Suggest Being Very Rich Is Its Own Qualification

[Aimless]

Study of Elite College Admissions Data Suggests Being Very Rich Is Its Own Qualification

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...e=articleShare

Paper: https://opportunityinsights.org/wp-c...ions_Paper.pdf

[Hazir]

Ah the new boogyman; inter-generational wealth. I'm looking forward to Gen A finding the works of Karl Marx and the likes.

[Aimless]

Ah the new boogyman; inter-generational wealth. I'm looking forward to Gen A finding the works of Karl Marx and the likes.

Mate, it's just research. The subject isn't even new.

[Hazir]

I know the subject isn't new. I do however also follow social trends and 'generational wealth' definitely is coming up as a new focal point in the culture wars. I'm pretty certain that the next step, to frame it as racism, already has been made.

[Loki]

When society was super-racist half a century ago and you support policies that lock in the social and economic status from half a century ago, how are you not perpetuating racism?

[wiggin]

Ah the new boogyman; inter-generational wealth. I'm looking forward to Gen A finding the works of Karl Marx and the likes.

So, Hazir, I actually think this isn't directly talking about intergenerational wealth at all. Caveat - I didn't read all 100-plus pages, just the ~5 page summary and skimmed the figures. But from what I did read, this study was trying to use some relatively clever techniques to determine (a) how much being in the elite (defined as top 1% household by income) influenced ability to gain entry to an 'Ivy plus' college, and why that happened, and (b) how much of an effect attending an Ivy plus college had on someone's chances of joining the elite.

I had some quibbles with their techniques - in particular I think using income percentile at age 33 may be premature (and their unwillingness to consider my alma maters as Ivy plus colleges ) - but overall I think they did a nice job adding to the corpus of literature on this subject. One thing they confirmed is that attendance at an Ivy plus college doesn't seem to change average income, so in that effect preferential admission due to e.g. athletics or legacy admissions or other things the 1% enjoy in far greater numbers might not have an impact on inequality on average. But they also showed that if you're interested in understanding who joins the elite, you have a much better chance of doing so if you attend such an institution, and you have a much better chance of attending such an institution if you're from the elite.

So I wouldn't say this is talking about intergenerational wealth so much as how we select the people who are overrepresented in politics, in business, and in culture. And they also provide evidence that it's possible for selective schools (notably the better class of public universities) to not fall into this trap in how they select their students. I think it's yet another piece of evidence that certain types of admissions to highly selective schools - especially legacy admissions - are unfair and should rightly be disposed of. And they brought receipts to prove it.

[Lewkowski]

When society was super-racist half a century ago and you support policies that lock in the social and economic status from half a century ago, how are you not perpetuating racism?

"lOcK iN"

The racism that is taking place are those who discriminate based on skin color and ethnicity. Do you advocate for the racist policy of discrimination based on skin?

[Hazir]

When society was super-racist half a century ago and you support policies that lock in the social and economic status from half a century ago, how are you not perpetuating racism?

Be a little bit less lazy and predictable?

[Loki]

You'd love feudalism.

[Aimless]

The comedic merits of Hazir going all in on his Randblade impersonation notwithstanding, it's a little weird and annoying that you people have lost the last vestiges of whatever ability you once had to engage with a story about interesting knowledge. Just incredibly sad to see.

[Hazir]

You'd love feudalism.

I am afraid you are wrong again.

While I may have no ready solution for the problem, it seems very obvious that the system as it stands doesn't deliver a satisfying result. Yet you hang on to it as if your lives depended on it. That was also visible when affirmative action was struck down. The reaction was as if that ruling was going to hurt minorities. But you'd have to be deaf, dumb and blind to see that affirmative action in itself was nothing but an ineffective band-aid. It just gave a very limited group inside minority communities access to the best universities. And it did very little to reduce the effects of inherited privilege. What it did do was give perfect cover for the exclusion of everybody else, the socio-economic disadvantaged of all 'races'.

[Hazir]

The comedic merits of Hazir going all in on his Randblade impersonation notwithstanding, it's a little weird and annoying that you people have lost the last vestiges of whatever ability you once had to engage with a story about interesting knowledge. Just incredibly sad to see.

Brevity doesn't equal unserious.

[Loki]

I am afraid you are wrong again.

While I may have no ready solution for the problem, it seems very obvious that the system as it stands doesn't deliver a satisfying result. Yet you hang on to it as if your lives depended on it. That was also visible when affirmative action was struck down. The reaction was as if that ruling was going to hurt minorities. But you'd have to be deaf, dumb and blind to see that affirmative action in itself was nothing but an ineffective band-aid. It just gave a very limited group inside minority communities access to the best universities. And it did very little to reduce the effects of inherited privilege. What it did do was give perfect cover for the exclusion of everybody else, the socio-economic disadvantaged of all 'races'.

What does this have to do with legacy admissions? It's hard to have a system deliver better results when a substantial number of admissions at top colleges are based on having rich parents.

[Hazir]

What does this have to do with legacy admissions? It's hard to have a system deliver better results when a substantial number of admissions at top colleges are based on having rich parents.

I was pointing out that affirmative action was used effectively as a cover that kept the legacy admissions out of the line of fire.

Maybe you should stop tuition fees acting as a real impediment for people even trying to get in.

[Loki]

Most of the Ivies are free to students whose families make less than $100k+.

[Hazir]

Most of the Ivies are free to students whose families make less than $100k+.

How generous of them. I hope you can say the same of the type of school that offers a pathway to be eligible for this generosity? And maybe while you’re at it tell us how that free education works for people whose families make over that threshold but live in a part of the country where that amount still means you’re living paycheck to paycheck?

[Aimless]

Most Ivies offer needs-based scholarships even for children from households earning more than $100k. I suspect the number of eligible students who're from households living "paycheck to paycheck" despite earning over $100k is small, but they can apply for (and will likely receive) some form of additional financial aid. In the context of the US higher ed system's well-known and much more severe problems, this is banal nitpicking.

[Hazir]

Actually it's just a reaction on a defense of a broken system. A system that is geared towards keeping the privileges for the privileged and their entitled children. Where lipservice to diversity and scraps falling off the table are used to polish up the reputation of what really happens.

[Aimless]

Interesting that you interpret it as a defense.

[Hazir]

Well, I don't think it's so great to hear that an educational system that's based on exclusion, lets in some poor slobs who've jumped through enough hoops.

[Hazir]

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/26/o...smid=url-share