To the victor go the spoils. A meritocracy is a system which rewards superior skill or ability. Great wealth inequality is often defended by those who claim that winners should take all, that superior performance deserves superior gains.
But as Scott Santens writes for Futurism, the main factor in where we end up in life is where we start in life. Using the Olympic games as an analogy, Santens shows how, from wealthy parents to performance enhancing drugs, what we call meritocracy actually rewards those who are given the best chance to succeed. A UBI would make meritocracy less of a fiction, supplying everyone with a decent starting point, so that winners don’t win just because the competition lacks the basic resources needed to even play the game.
For full article:
Scott Santens, “Universal Basic Income Will Help Us Level the Economic Playing Field” (March 24, 2017)
