Meritocracy as a derived factor of IQ drove the SES in post-communist era: do we need egalitarian social justice?

"Meritocracy or social justice? In closing, we wish to emphasize that we are not advocating meritocracy; these issues are more a matter of values than science. At first glance, meritocracy seems unquestionably good, but it could have unintended consequences such as creating social inequalities if societal rewards such as wealth are doled out on the basis of genetically driven abilities. The word meritocracy was coined by Michael Young, whose book, The Rise of the Meritocracy44, was meant as a cautionary tale about the dangers of meritocracy. The value system underlying meritocracy is that the point of education is to get better test scores in order to get better jobs and that the point of occupations is to achieve high status and make lots of money. A different way to look at education is as a time to learn basic skills but also to learn how to learn and to enjoy learning. It is a decade when children can find out what they like to do and what they are good at doing, finding their genetic selves. If education were universally good, there would be no need for selection, especially at the level of primary and second education, and thus there would be no need to apply meritocratic criteria. Similarly, with occupations, where selection cannot be avoided, we will end up with a lot of frustrated people if we only value high-status occupations that are highly remunerated. Society needs people who are good careworkers, nurses, plumbers, public servants and people in the service industry. To the extent that selection is necessary it should be meritocratic, but it is possible to imagine an occupational system that is not driven so much by monetary reward. For example, society could choose to reduce income inequality with a tax system that redistributes wealth. In his book, The Myth of Meritocracy, James Bloodworth45 argues that meritocracy leads to an inherent inequality of opportunity and reward based on genetic differences. He suggests that we need to replace meritocracy with what he calls a just society in which everyone could live well"

Genetic influence on social outcomes during and after the Soviet era in Estonia
Kaili Rimfeld 1 *, Eva Krapohl1 , Maciej Trzaskowski2 , Jonathan R. I. Coleman 1,3, Saskia Selzam1 , Philip S. Dale 4, Tonu Esko5 , Andres Metspalu5 and Robert Plomin1