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This post will concern why the pursuit of equality leads to outcomes that are opposite to the intended effect.
Genetic and environmental components constitute all human traits. This leads to a counterintuitive scenario that may have interesting explanatory power, as well as predictive implications, including policy formulation.
1. Unequal Environments: What exists in the world
The differences in outcomes between people are viewed as a result of unequal environments. The intuitive prescription is to boost the lowest environments so as to make equal “all” environments ideally, or at least bring all environments above some minimum threshold that allows for those at the bottom to compete effectively. So far so good.
Example: 1 million babies are born in a wealthy first-world country X, and 1 million babies are born in a famine-stricken country Y.
2. Equalization of Environments: What is viewed as good
If the ideal is achieved, and everyone could be given the exact same environment, then the differences in environmental components has been controlled for.
Example: Babies in country Y will have their growth stunted due to malnutrition, so they will be shorter on average than the wealthy country X.
