Is equality of opportunity worth it?

Ezra Klein blogs that "No one really believes in ‘equality of opportunity’," and goes on to suggest that equality of outcome and equality of opportunity are inseparable: "You can’t have real equality of opportunity without equality of outcome." His argument is that truly leveling the playing field in terms of the life chances of kids would require providing kids with poor parents the same start in life as kids with rich parents, and that would require providing them with... rich parents!

Well, that's not necessarily correct, as John Roemer has argued. One could imagine an equal opportunity policy regime in which the government provided compensatory assistance to kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, to the extent that a poor kid who worked just as hard to succeed as a rich kid could expect a roughly equal result... this need not entail giving the poor kid rich parents, but giving them enough other advantages to make up for the disadvantages of family background. But what Roemer and his co-author Julian Betts have shown is that such a policy could be enormously expensive. Based on what we know about the return to spending on education and other developmental policies, the bang for the buck is not that big, and the gap due to differences in family background is huge.

As Klein writes, Republicans often talk equal opportunity against Democrats' alleged support for equal outcomes (egalitarianism). But it's easy to imagine that any policy approaching true equality of opportunity would be much more costly to taxpayers than a highly redistributive tax-and-transfer egalitarianism. That would require the Republicans, based on their rhetoric, to be the big social spenders. Not really what they have in mind.

Down, boy!

As a public intellectual, Paul Krugman has done a lot more good than harm by speaking truth to power. But he does get carried away and sloppy. Righteous anger mixed with a regular op-ed deadline and the mixed blessing of his blog are probably to blame. His attacks on fellow academics who disagree with him have sometimes been intemperate and, perhaps worse, undiscriminating. I'm not so concerned that he has hurt Reinhart and Rogoff's feelings... more damaging is that he has hurt his own reputation as a straight shooter in the process. And to what end? The whole R&R kerfuffle has been a distraction.

Only the good die young

I would certainly place Billy Joel high on my top ten list of musicians I cannot stand. But it's nothing personal. And I do like this picture of him.

Your FSA/OWI Photo of the Day

Caguas, Puerto Rico (vicinity). Daughter of a farm laborer. Jack Delano, 1941.

Spoke too soon.

Back to the drawing board in Guatemala?

Can Music Be Perfect? Vol. 29

You don't know me... x3...

Your FSA/OWI Photo of the Day

At the May Day pageant in Siloam, Greene County, Georgia. Jack Delano, 1941.

Your FSA/OWI Photo of the Day

Car pooling at Lockheed Vega. Typical ride group: Don, a shopworker; Sheila, one of the factory girls who has taken over a man's job; Walt, production control; and Mary, stenographer. They are waiting for driver, Jerry, an engineering employee. David Bransby, 1942.