The Meritocracy Trap

[erp]

Okay - I finally got around to finishing this over Christmas after someone (Malcat?) recommended it on the forums. It was a pretty wild ride, I drifted a lot between being inclined to deny the basic premise of the book and thinking it was one of the most insightful things I've ever read.

Very, very briefly the author's argument is (this book contains a whole lot of ideas, and it's *really* hard to put it into a short summary):
1. We live in a meritocracy (ie. one where wealth and status tends to flow to those with certain 'meritous' skills and knowledge). This replaced the aristocracy, where wealth tended to be inherited and had little to do with skill.
2. This tends to force jobs into either super-ordinate (glossy) or subordinate (gloomy) jobs. The glossy ones pay absurdly well, have enormous responsibility and tend to require outrageous commitment in both time and development. The gloomy ones are paid abysmally, have no progression, and generally suck a lot. Glossy and gloomy jobs tend to replace mid-skilled jobs like middle management, small providers, etc. which formed the core of the middle class in the 1950s.
3. Since access to glossy jobs is gated by education and skill, the elite tend to spend a huge amount of money and energy training their children. This manifests in very high tuition, really serious competition from a very young age, highly scheduled lives, etc - and it continues more or less indefinitely. This means that these children are competition machines, extremely well tuned to this environment, and able to outcompete virtually anyone who doesn't have a similar background.
4a. The resulting system is awful for everyone. The gloomy jobs are just awful. The glossy jobs are better, but still take so much time and energy that quality of life suffers enormously. The future generation of elites is neurotic and anxious about their constant competition and almost no one from 'ordinary' education pathways can compete.
4b. There is an enormous gap between the life experiences of people who are deemed 'meritous' and people who are not in this system. They eat different foods, have different hobbies, support different rights (ie. LGBTQ folks are great, but higher taxes or wealth redistribution are terrible), and almost entirely view the world differently. This (might) explain things like the rise of populism, diverging health outcomes, different trends in associative mating, and a whole host of other weird bimodal patterns in society.
5. This emergent class of glossy jobbed, high education, urban folk seem to be tied to the descriptions of the 'liberal elite' which are becoming more broadly present in media descriptions. A common thread is that the 'meritous' members of society have become a new-aristocracy, but one which cannibalizes the middle class.
6. Since the meritocracy is bad for everyone (although definitely worse for some people than others), we should try to tear it down. Several policy proposals such as tying the non-profit status of elite educational institutions to student ratios (so more non-elite students can attend), changes in tax policy to incentivize more moderately paid positions rather than a few exorbitantly paid ones, and so forth are suggested. However, the core proposal is that we redefine 'economic value' in a different way.

All told, I think it was a fascinating read, and that the pattern sounds broadly true (and certainly true in my own life). I'm not at all sure it's as pervasive as described, but that could be regional variation, or even just the fact that I don't check enough of the boxes to be 'elite' in the parlance of the book. I think that while it's describing a social or cultural pattern, it doesn't really take into account how vast individual variation is.

I'd be very curious whether other people have read it, whether there are broad criticisms or interesting take aways with a MMM bent.

Two which came to my mind as I was reading were:
1- the FIRE movement is basically a return to aristocracy, checking out of the financial climb once you have enough to focus on other things which bring you joy/contentment/meaning (whether that's running long distances or building houses)
2- how tightly tied to status our jobs are, and that one of the main struggles for people who FIRE (on these forums) seems to be how you develop meaning and purpose outside of a job structure. This seems to support the premise that after a certain point, the meritocracy is about status and the income is almost beside the point.

Thoughts?

[PKFFW]

Haven't read the book so I have a question I hope you can answer....

Is the premise of the book that modern western democratic societies are actually meritocracies or that we as a society believe the myth that such societies are meritocracies?

[Herbert Derp]

This reminds me of a quote from Thomas Jefferson:

For I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men. The grounds of this are virtue and talents. Formerly bodily powers gave place among the aristoi. But since the invention of gunpowder has armed the weak as well as the strong with missile death, bodily strength, like beauty, good humor, politeness and other accomplishments, has become but an auxiliary ground of distinction. There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth, without either virtue or talents; for with these it would belong to the first class. The natural aristocracy I consider as the most precious gift of nature for the instruction, the trusts, and government of society. And indeed it would have been inconsistent in creation to have formed man for the social state, and not to have provided virtue and wisdom enough to manage the concerns of the society. May we not even say that that form of government is the best which provides the most effectually for a pure selection of these natural aristoi into the offices of government? The artificial aristocracy is a mischievous ingredient in government, and provision should be made to prevent it's ascendancy.

I would generally agree that we live in a meritocracy where there is both a "new aristocracy" based on natural talent and an "old aristocracy" based on wealth and connections.

[Rubic]

The gloomy jobs are just awful. The glossy jobs are better, but still take so much time
and energy that quality of life suffers enormously. The future generation of elites is
neurotic and anxious about their constant competition and almost no one from 'ordinary'
education pathways can compete.

In 2013 economist Tyler Cowan published a book titled "Average is Over".

He explained that high earners were taking ever more advantage of machine intelligence and
achieving ever-better results. Meanwhile, nearly every business sector relies less and less on
manual labor, and that means a steady, secure life somewhere in the middle -- average -- is over.

I haven't read The Meritocracy Trap, but Tyler Cowan's observations, while clear-eyed,
don't appear as pessimistic as the summary that OP has posted on this book.

[roomtempmayo]

4a. The resulting system is awful for everyone. The gloomy jobs are just awful. The glossy jobs are better, but still take so much time and energy that quality of life suffers enormously. The future generation of elites is neurotic and anxious about their constant competition and almost no one from 'ordinary' education pathways can compete.

Michael Sandel's recent book The Tyranny of Merit does a good job of explaining why nobody really wins in a meritocratic system.  I read it about a year ago, and the gist is that even those on top of the meritocracy are on a constant treadmill of trying to facilitate their kids and grandkids replicating their success by pouring resources into their education and development.  This continual striving is corrosive to individuals, families, communities, and nations.

However, I'm not sure that any of these problems, or at least the intensity of these problems, are inherent to meritocracy.  They seem to be peculiarly American problems of attaching meritocracy to a winner-takes-almost-all economy.

In places that are meritocratic but where the range of schools, neighborhoods, and the dignity and compensation of occupations is significantly more compressed - like, say, Denmark - I don't think you see the same degree of professional class anxiety, working class resentment, and highly medicated kids being pushed, pushed, pushed.

To me, meritocracy seems like a better distributional principle than past alternatives like aristocracy.  It only becomes toxic when it's linked to an economic system of massive inequality, and that doesn't get much attention.

[erp]

Haven't read the book so I have a question I hope you can answer....

Is the premise of the book that modern western democratic societies are actually meritocracies or that we as a society believe the myth that such societies are meritocracies?

Great question - the premise of the book is that modern western societies are meritocracies (in particular, that the US is). However, there's a kind of counter intuitive definition of meritocracy within that - it's very much the 'winner take all' system which tends to go to people who have very high education/specialized skill. The book is *not* working on a definition of 'person with the most merit is the most successful'.

[erp]

Thanks for your insights @Rubic and @caleb - I'll take a look at both the sources you reference (I'm familiar with Tyler Cowen, but haven't heard of Michael Sandel before).

I really appreciate the comment about the winner take all economy being a core issue with this system - maybe even being the actual issue. Certainly from a Canadian perspective I feel less anxiety then seems to be omnipresent in my American colleagues - so maybe you're onto something in arguing for a much compressed dignity/status/compensation mechanism.

I'm always just thrilled by the responses on this forum, thanks for the thoughts!

[PKFFW]

Great question - the premise of the book is that modern western societies are meritocracies (in particular, that the US is). However, there's a kind of counter intuitive definition of meritocracy within that - it's very much the 'winner take all' system which tends to go to people who have very high education/specialized skill. The book is *not* working on a definition of 'person with the most merit is the most successful'.

Thanks for the response.

With the mass of nearly irrefutable evidence to show that factors completely out of one's own control and that have nothing to do with "merit" (skin colour and/or being born into a wealth family to name just two) play an outsized role in who becomes the "winner" that "takes it all", it seems a rather weird definition of "meritocracy".

[roomtempmayo]

Great question - the premise of the book is that modern western societies are meritocracies (in particular, that the US is). However, there's a kind of counter intuitive definition of meritocracy within that - it's very much the 'winner take all' system which tends to go to people who have very high education/specialized skill. The book is *not* working on a definition of 'person with the most merit is the most successful'.

Thanks for the response.

With the mass of nearly irrefutable evidence to show that factors completely out of one's own control and that have nothing to do with "merit" (skin colour and/or being born into a wealth family to name just two) play an outsized role in who becomes the "winner" that "takes it all", it seems a rather weird definition of "meritocracy".

I think for most of the meritocracy critics, "merit" is a set of qualifications from SAT scores, to degrees, to professional licenses. 

Another way to think of merit is as a system that aims to bracket the background and identity of the individual in order to emphasize their qualifications.

[maizefolk]

One of the key things I took away from The Meritocracy Trap is that there is how much parents can do to shape the actual competitiveness (and so merit depending on your definition) of their children.

The author goes into a lot of depth about the studies showing the impact of early childhood enrichment and quality of education and parental engagement (up to and including having one spouse stay home to focus on child rearing) that the rich can afford and tend to spend a lot on all shift the odds that children will be able to compete effectively for slots in elite schools and then in elite jobs that will pay them enough to invest huge amounts of time and money into increasing the competitiveness (or perhaps "merit") of their own children.

Given the above, "meritocratic" selection procedures are inherently going to identify sets of people who aren't very representative of the overall population. Not because the selection procedures are flawed in some way. But because wealthy and successful people (an unrepresentative bunch of folks) have the capability and motivation to invest a lot more into their own children.

[Metalcat]

Yup, that was one of my book recommendations.

It's a book that I instinctively pushed back against while reading, and then when I was done it stayed with me for a long time, and then I wanted everyone to read it, because it really helped frame how I think about a lot of things.

Glad you enjoyed it.

[PKFFW]

I think for most of the meritocracy critics, "merit" is a set of qualifications from SAT scores, to degrees, to professional licenses. 

Another way to think of merit is as a system that aims to bracket the background and identity of the individual in order to emphasize their qualifications.

I think for most, critics or otherwise, "meritocracy" would mean something along the lines of a system in which the person selected for a position is the one best qualified and, as far as fair and unbiased selection processes can determine, likely to be the most capable to perform the role.  I think it would be very few that would use the word "meritocracy" to mean simply a "winner takes all" system because such a system does not necessarily have anything at all to do with "merit".

I freely grant you that the rich and powerful are better able to provide education, experience, resources, and support to their child to help them become such a person who would be selected in such a system described above.

Evidence shows the nearly irrefutable reality is that modern western democracies are not such systems.

[dang1]

late-stage capitalism

[Michael in ABQ]

I haven't read the book, but how does it address those who are financially successful but don't obtain a "glossy" job? I.e. those who are self-employed? Business ownership has always been a path to wealth and success, as evidenced by the fact that virtually every billionaire generated almost all their wealth through starting/growing a business.

There are plenty of people who never even graduated college, let alone were in the top 1-2% of elite colleges, who built businesses that are worth millions. Having those elite connections may help you if you want to startup a business in Silicon Valley with a bunch of investors and try to get an exit of tens of millions. But if you want to start a construction company, or HVAC company, or any of a thousand other non-elite types of companies you can still do so.

[erp]

I think for most of the meritocracy critics, "merit" is a set of qualifications from SAT scores, to degrees, to professional licenses. 

Another way to think of merit is as a system that aims to bracket the background and identity of the individual in order to emphasize their qualifications.

I think for most, critics or otherwise, "meritocracy" would mean something along the lines of a system in which the person selected for a position is the one best qualified and, as far as fair and unbiased selection processes can determine, likely to be the most capable to perform the role.  I think it would be very few that would use the word "meritocracy" to mean simply a "winner takes all" system because such a system does not necessarily have anything at all to do with "merit".

I freely grant you that the rich and powerful are better able to provide education, experience, resources, and support to their child to help them become such a person who would be selected in such a system described above.

Evidence shows the nearly irrefutable reality is that modern western democracies are not such systems.

Definitely no objection from me - I agree 100% that it's a weird definition. In addition to caleb's clarification I'd suggest that there's some history to the word. The current system is more meritocratic than the aristocracy it replaced (mostly), and was named in that context. I have continued to use the phrase because it's the language of the book, but don't think it's the most correct word.

[erp]

I haven't read the book, but how does it address those who are financially successful but don't obtain a "glossy" job? I.e. those who are self-employed? Business ownership has always been a path to wealth and success, as evidenced by the fact that virtually every billionaire generated almost all their wealth through starting/growing a business.

There are plenty of people who never even graduated college, let alone were in the top 1-2% of elite colleges, who built businesses that are worth millions. Having those elite connections may help you if you want to startup a business in Silicon Valley with a bunch of investors and try to get an exit of tens of millions. But if you want to start a construction company, or HVAC company, or any of a thousand other non-elite types of companies you can still do so.

This is a huge gap in the book - jobs like you describe (whether it's starting the company or working for a smaller company which doesn't have the traits that are described) aren't addressed at all. I think it's a fair statement to say that there are fewer of these roles then there were in the 1950s, but it is absolutely still a viable pathway to wealth. I think the classic "millionaire next door" type simply doesn't exist in the worldview presented by the book - it's clearly a somewhat incomplete model.

Similarly, the book doesn't really address the possibility that someone could live somewhat frugally and earn meaningful investment income. We all know this is possible, but it wasn't really part of the discussion in the text of the book.

To your more specific question - the 'glossiness' of owning a business would probably hinge on the status associated with the work? I've seen people who own 'blue collar' businesses get looked down on for absolutely no good reason, and also seen marginal businesses get a lot of hype because they happened to be trendy. I think the glossy/gloomy description is pretty simplistic because it's trying to capture status, earning, education, achievement, opportunity and a host of other factors. Some jobs just don't have all of those together (ie. adjunct professors who have the education and prestige, but no earning power and very limited opportunity); I suspect that business ownership is another example of a job/career which doesn't slot nicely into gloomy or glossy.

One final thought on this - HVAC repair/roofing/etc. type business are good - the fact that starting a successful company which does this kind of work is capitalism working the way that everyone says they want it to. The income inequality that the author objects to seems to be more like "Safeway CEO who earns 100+ times what his employees do because all of the growth positions have been automated away" then "small business owner creates a dozen well paid jobs and provides valuable service to the region". He'd like to curtail the first example while preserving the second.

[roomtempmayo]

I think for most of the meritocracy critics, "merit" is a set of qualifications from SAT scores, to degrees, to professional licenses. 

Another way to think of merit is as a system that aims to bracket the background and identity of the individual in order to emphasize their qualifications.

I think for most, critics or otherwise, "meritocracy" would mean something along the lines of a system in which the person selected for a position is the one best qualified and, as far as fair and unbiased selection processes can determine, likely to be the most capable to perform the role.  I think it would be very few that would use the word "meritocracy" to mean simply a "winner takes all" system because such a system does not necessarily have anything at all to do with "merit".

I freely grant you that the rich and powerful are better able to provide education, experience, resources, and support to their child to help them become such a person who would be selected in such a system described above.

Evidence shows the nearly irrefutable reality is that modern western democracies are not such systems.

Can you clarify the "such systems" comment above?

Are they not systems where those who are best able to fill a role are selected for it?

Or that they aren't systems where those with resources are better able to set their kids up for success?

There's no inherent connection between the principle of distribution in a society (i.e. merit, family name, etcetera) and the degree of inequality that's socially allowed or desired (i.e. Nordic social democracy versus American libertarian capitalism).  My comment above about winner-take-all systems was that many of the problems of meritocracy are really only big problems if merit is used as a distributional principle in a highly unequal society (i.e. the US).  I'm not really convinced that merit is the problem, but rather that we in the US are using it in a system where the stakes are too high.

[roomtempmayo]

I haven't read the book, but how does it address those who are financially successful but don't obtain a "glossy" job? I.e. those who are self-employed?

I think self-employment is an alternative path to meritocracy.

Meritocracy isn't about whether your work is good, or meritorious in a general sense.

It refers to work where other people - not the market - evaluate you based on qualifications.  It's a reference to highly gate-kept, credentialed fields where everyone who succeeds has to impress lots of people along the way to get to where they are.

[maizefolk]

My comment above about winner-take-all systems was that many of the problems of meritocracy are really only big problems if merit is used as a distributional principle in a highly unequal society (i.e. the US).  I'm not really convinced that merit is the problem, but rather that we in the US are using it in a system where the stakes are too high.

I think I'm mostly aligned with you on this, but one interesting point the author made about this is that a system aligned around selecting/admitting/promoting people based on merit makes it harder to build consensus around intervention to reduce inequality.

I've always been fascinated by the ultimatum game. One person is given, say, $20 to divide between themselves and another person in any proportion and the second person either accepts the split, or rejects it and both people get $0. The economically rational optimal outcome would be for first person to propose a very uneven split and the second person to accept it (since any amount of money is better than zero money). Yet, at least among western educated college students where most psych research is done, second person tends to reject uneven proposed splits punishing unfairness even at the cost of less good outcomes for themselves. And, perhaps as a result the first person in the same experiments tends to propose relatively even divisions.

However, this mechanism of punishing unfairness and so ensuring more equal outcomes tends to breakdown if the two people have first engaged in any sort of skill or effort based contest and the first person won. Now the first person will propose much more uneven splits, and the second person will accept much more uneven splits. I could imagine the meritocratic system in the USA working in a similar way, priming people to accept far more unequal outcomes than they otherwise would.

[PKFFW]

Can you clarify the "such systems" comment above?

Are they not systems where those who are best able to fill a role are selected for it?

Or that they aren't systems where those with resources are better able to set their kids up for success?

There's no inherent connection between the principle of distribution in a society (i.e. merit, family name, etcetera) and the degree of inequality that's socially allowed or desired (i.e. Nordic social democracy versus American libertarian capitalism).  My comment above about winner-take-all systems was that many of the problems of meritocracy are really only big problems if merit is used as a distributional principle in a highly unequal society (i.e. the US).  I'm not really convinced that merit is the problem, but rather that we in the US are using it in a system where the stakes are too high.

The underlined "such systems" refers to systems in which the "best" (hard to define obviously but is what is generally trying to be selected) person for the role is selected in an unbiased way and is based on the requirements of the role and who is likely to best meet those requirements.  Try as we might, and much progress has been made, such systems are rare.  I agree that the rich have advantages that would assist in actually making a person the best suited to a role under such a system.  For example they have the resources to undertake training and education required, they have more access to mentoring from those already in the industry or role, etc. They are better positioned to start their own company and give themselves whatever role they like or take some other similar path. That doesn't change the fact that the system isn't really what most people would mean by "meritocracy".

I agree that a merit based system isn't a problem in and of itself. In fact, I think in a perfect world, it would be a great system if combined with a social safety net type thing. I was just wondering how the book defined "meritocracy" because the OP's comments made it seem that the book defined it differently to the way I have always heard it used.

ETA: I'm referring to "jobs" here because that is the situation that applies to the overwhelming majority, even among the rich, of people.

[erp]

One other element which the book talks about at length is that the practice of selecting the "best" person for the role has tended to change the roles themselves. One example is hiring physicists for financial quant jobs - they tend to have stronger analytical and computational skills, which meant the roles became more computational, which meant more decisions based on analytics ... which ultimately meant larger inequality because you're solving more problems with a system then with a case by case review. The physicist quants make way more money, but there's not many of them. Most of the case by case middle managers get fired, so they make much less.

The merit based system isn't an issue in theory, but it tends to shape society and policy in ways that might lead to things that are different from "the best person gets the job" as a second order impact.

[grantmeaname]

Evidence shows the nearly irrefutable reality is that modern western democracies are not such systems.

edit: rewriting this to not be a grumpy asshole, sorry PKFFW.

I think the author agrees with you because the summaries of the book are filled with words like "false promise" and "sham". I haven't read the book but the press appearances from the book tour seem much more geared to "here is how our notion of meritocracy is failing everyone" than "we have a meritocracy and there are unintended consequences of how successfully meritocratic we are". To the extent that you two disagree, it might be more like you thinking of heavenly/objective merit and him referring to merit as "whatever baubles you are asked to collect by the system"...

ABOUT THE MERITOCRACY TRAP
A revolutionary new argument from eminent Yale Law professor Daniel Markovits attacking the false promise of meritocracy

It is an axiom of American life that advantage should be earned through ability and effort. Even as the country divides itself at every turn, the meritocratic ideal – that social and economic rewards should follow achievement rather than breeding – reigns supreme.  Both Democrats and Republicans insistently repeat meritocratic notions. Meritocracy cuts to the heart of who we are. It sustains the American dream.
 
But what if, both up and down the social ladder, meritocracy is a sham? Today, meritocracy has become exactly what it was conceived to resist: a mechanism for the concentration and dynastic transmission of wealth and privilege across generations. Upward mobility has become a fantasy, and the embattled middle classes are now more likely to sink into the working poor than to rise into the professional elite. At the same time, meritocracy now ensnares even those who manage to claw their way to the top, requiring rich adults to work with crushing intensity, exploiting their expensive educations in order to extract a return. All this is not the result of deviations or retreats from meritocracy but rather stems directly from meritocracy’s successes.
 
This is the radical argument that Daniel Markovits prosecutes with rare force. Markovits is well placed to expose the sham of meritocracy. Having spent his life at elite universities, he knows from the inside the corrosive system we are trapped within. Markovits also knows that, if we understand that meritocratic inequality produces near-universal harm, we can cure it. When The Meritocracy Trap reveals the inner workings of the meritocratic machine, it also illuminates the first steps outward, towards a new world that might once again afford dignity and prosperity to the American people.

[RetiredAt63]

Thanks for your insights @Rubic and @caleb - I'll take a look at both the sources you reference (I'm familiar with Tyler Cowen, but haven't heard of Michael Sandel before).

I really appreciate the comment about the winner take all economy being a core issue with this system - maybe even being the actual issue. Certainly from a Canadian perspective I feel less anxiety then seems to be omnipresent in my American colleagues - so maybe you're onto something in arguing for a much compressed dignity/status/compensation mechanism.

I'm always just thrilled by the responses on this forum, thanks for the thoughts!

Two thoughts on this -

1. I saw a study a while ago (please don't ask me to find it) that Canada has much more upward social mobility than the US does.

2.  We don't have an educational system that has an Ivy League University system that pops people into categories.  I mean, McGill, U of T, Laval are world class universities, but you don't have to be in an elite to attend them.  And we have lots of really good universities*.  And tuition is relatively affordable.  I say this as a Queen's/McGill Grad with a M. Sc. who went into CEGEP teaching and never made more than $80K a year (we know how sucky Quebec para-public salaries are).

I mean, without even thinking, there is UBC, U Alberta, U Manitoba, Waterloo, U of T, Queen's, U of Ottawa, Carleton, McGill, Concordia, U du Montreal, UQAM, Laval, Dalhousie.  I'd be happy to have a child go to any of those (actually mine did go to one of those) and there are lots that I am not thinking of because I am most familiar with Quebec/Ontario.

[maizefolk]

1. I saw a study a while ago (please don't ask me to find it) that Canada has much more upward social mobility than the US does.

One of the tricky things I've seem come up in studies like the one you describe is how upward mobility is quantified. If it is change in income percentile of children relative to their parents the USA tends to look pretty bad. If it is absolute change in income of children relative to their parents the USA tends to look a lot better.

Another way to think about this is that a move from the 40th to the 80th percentile of household incomes is a much larger change in absolute income in the USA. And doubling ones absolute income is a much bigger percentile change in most other countries than it is in the USA.

One can imagine the arguments for why either of these metrics is a better or worse measurement of intergenerational mobility.

[PKFFW]

edit: rewriting this to not be a grumpy asshole, sorry PKFFW.

I think the author agrees with you because the summaries of the book are filled with words like "false promise" and "sham". I haven't read the book but the press appearances from the book tour seem much more geared to "here is how our notion of meritocracy is failing everyone" than "we have a meritocracy and there are unintended consequences of how successfully meritocratic we are". To the extent that you two disagree, it might be more like you thinking of heavenly/objective merit and him referring to merit as "whatever baubles you are asked to collect by the system"...

ABOUT THE MERITOCRACY TRAP
A revolutionary new argument from eminent Yale Law professor Daniel Markovits attacking the false promise of meritocracy

It is an axiom of American life that advantage should be earned through ability and effort. Even as the country divides itself at every turn, the meritocratic ideal – that social and economic rewards should follow achievement rather than breeding – reigns supreme.  Both Democrats and Republicans insistently repeat meritocratic notions. Meritocracy cuts to the heart of who we are. It sustains the American dream.
 
But what if, both up and down the social ladder, meritocracy is a sham? Today, meritocracy has become exactly what it was conceived to resist: a mechanism for the concentration and dynastic transmission of wealth and privilege across generations. Upward mobility has become a fantasy, and the embattled middle classes are now more likely to sink into the working poor than to rise into the professional elite. At the same time, meritocracy now ensnares even those who manage to claw their way to the top, requiring rich adults to work with crushing intensity, exploiting their expensive educations in order to extract a return. All this is not the result of deviations or retreats from meritocracy but rather stems directly from meritocracy’s successes.
 
This is the radical argument that Daniel Markovits prosecutes with rare force. Markovits is well placed to expose the sham of meritocracy. Having spent his life at elite universities, he knows from the inside the corrosive system we are trapped within. Markovits also knows that, if we understand that meritocratic inequality produces near-universal harm, we can cure it. When The Meritocracy Trap reveals the inner workings of the meritocratic machine, it also illuminates the first steps outward, towards a new world that might once again afford dignity and prosperity to the American people.

Thank you for the info.  As I mentioned in my first post, I have not read the book.  My questions were attempting to figure out what the premise was and how "meritocracy" was being applied.  I think you are right that it seems the book generally agrees with what I think when I hear the term "meritocracy" and apply it to society in general.  It seems it's very much a matter of terminology and how it is being used, rather than a fundamentally different point of view.