Via The Daily Caller:
The College Republicans at the University of California-Merced ask fellow students, who support raising taxes on the rich, if they would be willing to redistribute their GPAs. They don’t think it’s a good idea because they earned their grades.
Oh. (HT: The Blaze)
The more I think about this the more I think that this is the most comically faulty analogy ever. What this study shows is why people don’t like College Republicans.
College Republicans, I would guess, would be hated by their fellow students on the left, because the latter are unable to refute their ideas. It is your response Dan that is faulty, though you say that it is the analogy is comically faulty–and that people hate College Republicans–that’s right, shame them when you can’t think of real response. That’s the way to refute an idea–go ad hominem.
It is an excellent analogy. There are many people who under socialism stop producing (I for one): the productive because there’s no incentive when you are taxed to oblivion and the non-productive because there’s no incentive when your pay cheque is handed to you without working. And a university that practised grade redistribution would have the same effect on academic achievement. The ‘A’ student would drop out, because his grades are being given to others (Atlas shrugs –you see I’m giving Rand a pass!!), and the poor student who never works hard any way, will get a passing mark. The result would be that far less academic work would be done by both the good and bad students. It is just like socialism. And by the way, as a person who is over taxed, I feel just like those pinko students who say it would be unfair to give their marks to poor students!
But of course the analogy will have little effect on these students who haven’t actually joined the work force and had their hard-earned money stolen from them by redistributionist government. But threaten to share their grades with others and they would become indignant.
One earns both money and grades. Therefore, the following argument can be implicitly reconstructed from the survey:
1) If it is unfair to take away grades because I earned them, then it is unfair to take away money because I earned it.
2) It is unfair to take away grades because I earned them.
3) Therefore, it is unfair to take away money because I earned it.
This argument is valid (modus poens). The second premise is accepted by the college students. So the only one you can reject is the first. Since the first looks quite reasonable, this is not a faulty analogy at all.
I think there are a couple issues with the analogy`s premise.
1- We all pay taxes! We do not all have to give back a portion of our grades.
2- I benefit, in some way, by paying taxes, I would in no way benefit by giving back some credits to weaker students.
So we are comparing to different things.
Also, if we are going to argue it is unfair to take money away “Because I earned it”, we have to say it is unfair to pay any tax at all…even the one the “poor” pay.
Well, if more students got higher grades, they’d have a better chance of getting better education later on, etc.
Sure you benefit from giving the weaker students grades. (1) Now those weaker students can graduate and compete with you for jobs, and that provides job competition in the marketplace; (2) the weaker students won’t drop out and make your university look like it doesn’t care about students–no child left behind–who wants to attend an uncaring University? (3) those weaker students will be able to graduate and get jobs in their field so they are less likely to go on welfare and less likely to default on their student loans, which otherwise could cause the next financial crisis; (4) weaker students could collapse mentally and spiritually, and fallen on hard luck become addicted to drugs and begin to steal from the more academically gifted students; (5) it is essentially unfair that some students fail and others get good grades–so grade inflation and grade redistribution are just means by which everyone becomes equal so that we come closer to the kind of society that we all want to live in.
No, that’s humour.
There’s no incentive to produce, really? I’m pretty sure I’m doing better than if I was just on welfare or something.
What the analogy really misses is how grades are allocated. If grades were allocated by the A students to the failing kids for having done the grunt work on the A kids’ assignments at a rate that the A kids deemed acceptable, it might be a different story.
Also, grades tend to be distributed in a bell-curve type distribution. Wealth is decidedly not. http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
Incidentally, I think the College Repubs here were trying to be cheeky, so I reckon I can be cheeky back.
Dan’s first point is correct. But it does not argue against the argument I pointed out. If failing students contributed to the work that an A student got an A for, then the failing student earned part of the A grade. This seems obvious.
The second point is not nearly so obvious. While grades are currently distributed in a bell-curve and income is not, this is a factual matter of dubious relevance to a discussion of the argument. There are a number of people who argue that grades should not be distributed by a bell-curve (I am sympathetic to that argument). The mere fact that wealth is not equally distributed is irrelevant to whether or not the analogy succeeds.
The issue of taxes is quite different. I do not want to mention it simply because some do believe that all taxes are unjust. It would expand the argument unnecessarily to show otherwise and deal with its relation to this analogy. Mat, which premise of the analogy does the fact (or obligation) of taxation refute? How?
I met a orchard owner from Michigan, and he spoke of the hard work that the Mexicans do in his orchard. Many people who had a choice of welfare or working in an orchard like these folks, would find that the work in the sun in the summer and cold in the winter, would just find it easier and considerably more convenient to collect a welfare cheque. I offered work (clean my garage) to student last summer but he found it unrewarding, so he quit. He could just live off his mum. So either way, the people who do certain jobs do it out of necessity. (My neighbor was laid off and wasn’t really looking for a job as long as he could collect unemployment–it may have paid as good as lower paying jobs that he could get but it requires far less effort and time.
Seems like you are suggesting a labor theory of value.
The fact is that the workers and owners alike are stolen from through excessive taxation to give people who don’t work money. That’s exactly what grade redistribution would do.
I see the point they’re trying to make. The only counter argument I could think of is that some don’t have the same opportunities. At a university, everyone is on a level playing field. You go to class, read the books, write the essays and exams and your grades reflect how well you did.
In the real world there are individuals who do work hard and who are smart, yet as they never had the financial ability to go to school and earn more. Their income is a reflection of generational inequality and not performance. They could be the best grocery store clerk and that’s all they ever had the chance to be.
But I don’t my description above applies to everyone, in which case the video makes a valid point.
Jason, you pointed out something that does have value, but does not negate the argument above. Due to considerations of justice, some do not have equal opportunities. Oddly enough, that is usually due to government interference. For example, the government protects black bullies at school (and elsewhere) simply because they are black. This causes their black neighbors to suffer and lose chances they might have to do well. Since the argument above refers to earnings, one shouldn’t take away the money we earn to protect criminals. Instead, we should fine the criminals to protect everyone else!
The analogy is sound.
You will notice in the video that the students tried to analyze the situation by applying the flawed rhetoric from their professors. Rather than “think” it through, they just laid on liberal trash as a substitute for rational thought.
A long time ago, I was in a graduate “educational research” class. One student said “I can’t decide what to write my thesis on and it is getting me down.”
The Prof asked if anyone had a comment so I did.
I told him that if he were to go out into the world and work at any job and preferably several jobs, he would be able to come back and easily choose what he wanted to write for his thesis!
He sneered at me and when I looked at the prof, I realized that he was a professional student himself (never been out of the classroom.) I got a low grade in that class although I received a 4.0 at a higher institution later for expressing the same ideas.
You lose this one Mat. Yes a lot of us pay taxes. Most of us have no problem with the ‘PORTION’ of our taxes that go to such things as for example, our interstate highway system, our military who have and are currently defending this country, veterans hospitals for our veterans, public schools, and a myriad of other things that benefit all of us. HOWEVER; the remaining PORTION of our taxes that are extorted from us and GIVEN to the ‘welfare crowd’, (a.k.a. I want something from the government crowd) we take great exception to. And this is where the analogy IS IN FACT valid. This is the only means with which a leftist politician can remain in office by the way, which is promising the ‘I want something from the government crowd’ what they want, or at least a small pittance thereof. When was the last time you heard a leftist politician telling one of his constituents that instead of expecting a hand out from the government, via robbing from someone who is working and has EARNED it, to instead get up off of his lazy ass and get a job. It will never happen, as that would be a sure way for that politician to commit political suicide. This makes the leftist politicians the most deceitful, immoral, disgusting, vile, human beings on the face of the planet. By the way I got so sick and tired of seeing so much of what I worked for during my life being taken from me and redistributed to the ‘I want something from the government crowd’, that I too quit working at age 62, closed up my business, let my employees go, and started drawing my social security. I was one of the hard workers, who has now quit. I’m no longer contributing to the welfare crowd. I am urging as many others as I can to do the same. Tell me, ‘PLEASE’ what is the government going to do when they run out of pockets of the producers to pick clean???
I don’t know who it is that you’re trying to snow here, but it won’t be me. Since when does a ‘failing’ student contribute anything to the hard work and studying of an A or B student. Further I’d like for you to explain how a FAILING student, by definition of FAILING, contributes to the A student. Carrying the A students perhaps!!! I went through high school and college, and there wasn’t one time that a failing student EVER contributed to my A’s and B’s. NOT ONCE!!! I earned my grades just like the failing student earned theirs. Try again, when you’re more clear minded, perhaps you’ll be able to make logical sense sometime in the future.
Ira: you and C. Edmund Wright are business owners that say they have shut down; he writes:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/12/blame_me_for_job_losses.html
Monty Pelerin says that capital, both intellectual and financial, is taking flight to more friendly places: http://www.economicnoise.com/2011/06/23/atlas-is-shrugging-in-the-us-and-flexing-his-muscles-elsewhere/
Mat and all the others,the point to be made is: IF I work hard and achieve something,,,ie grades, paycheck, gold, cars, etc. where is it proper and right to take my hard earned belongings away to give to a person who wont work, and is a drain on the economy/country?
Or lets say the college gets better dorms, class rooms, equipment, teachers if everyone passes rather than say a 20% failure rate.
Then would you like the analogy?
The analogy is if I work hard and make more money or study harder and get(make) higher grades should I the hard worker be penalized by “you” (the lower grade earner not you as in you) and have my hard work benefit you.
The answer is no.
The answer is that if the tax rate now has the highest wage earners ,47% to 53% of all working people, paying the majority of the US taxes, then why would it be fair to take say another 10% ,20%, 30%, 40% or hey lets just take 90% of their pay to pay for free health care ,and studying bull frogs mating and all of the other crap programs out there.
Oh and free health care is a fallacy its not free just government controlled.
See if we took all wealth, profits and high wages, 100% you would not even pay the interest on the debt.
Oh and if we take from your 4.0 GPA and give to the 3.0 GPA then your both 3.0,,,but then we need 5 more GPA points ofr the guy who has the 1.2 or 2.0 GPA so next semester we will take 2 points from you or maybe 3.
See more “taxes “wont fix it. getting the lazy bugger to do more with less and make a better situation for them selves works better.
How about the government employees who love the idea of more taxes cause the “rich” are greedy give up their pension and benefits and take normal private industry wages?
hmmm see taking more doesnt work. Same as if you use credit cards to pay your bills but only pay the minimum,,,eventually you have to be cut off. No more credit, no more wild spending.
Guess what Conservatives want,,,,cut up the credit card, its maxed out you fool.
Nope we cant tell government how to spend our taxes so you cant tell them how to distribute grades.
Oh and forget grades on “curves” pass is pass. no more curves or setting the bar at the lowest student. how about you all get a bar to reach for, miss it and you get what you got.
If your future job is to make 1700 widgets then you get a bonus, thats a bars to meet, now if the best a lazy guy does is 1500 thats the bar the bonus is given,,,,sorry thats the employee taking before the extra profit is made.
You can hug your sociology book all you want, you are programed to want social justice, social equality and yada yada yada.
Sorry, here we go, if you work hard and meet the goals set, then you get bonus if not , you dont.
Its called life, its called business. Workers dont tell business how much they get paid, they can ask for a pay rate, but if the cost to build a plant, make a part, sell a part, keep it open costs $1000 per person, and each person makes $2000 in normal operating parameters the employee asking for $3500 is ,guess what, out of the question.
your foolishness is blatant and infantile.
Work gets you $xxxxx, you want more you get to work harder or change to better job, you dont get to demand better pay with no increase in production.
IF YOU FAIL, YOU FAIL! If you dont make the company money your a drain on it.
Guess how wealth is built, by hard work. you dont work, you dont get wealth, you dont study you dont get grades.
Grades are pay for hard studying .
Good grades get you a good job and get you bigger paychecks. Invest it, spend,save and build wealth properly. Never learning how to build wealth and blowing all your cash will leave you spent and broke.
I know a kid, he has worked all his life since he could push a lawn mower. He is now a college grad, paid for with his own money, he is a smart guy and he is 26 or 27 and a doctor. Oh and he has over $1,000,000 in the bank. Why, because he just graduated and started residency this spring, nope because he learned how to save, and invest and build what he earned. His med school bills are PAID. His schedule while in school was mowing lawns, doing landscaping, and such,,while in school and making a 4.0 GPA.
Hospital gave him job, then came back and broke contract,,, he is now using some of his cash to build a clinic he will work in and staff. His work so far is out of a rented building. his projected profit over next 5 years, well over $5,000,000.
why because he is working for it, and every patient seen by him or colleagues will be money in his pocket.
But he should give it all away for a bum to get as check?
hmmmm.
Same doctors brother has never graduated school High nor college. BUT he did same thing, worked hard, he is 22 or 23, younger brother, he worked all his life. Even worked with brother landscaping,,,, he is buy that company off his brother for $150,000 over time as his doctor brother had equipment bought. But they both have cash in bank. WHY hard work.
But the You/government think they need to pay more. Why because he was a hard worker, spent wisely and made money.
Your a failed socialist and have no clue.
The test was to see if you could think about the fairness of redistribution theory. You instead try to make excuses and redirect why its not the same.
IT is the same. Hard work pays, lazy bums should starve. Pick you list, hard worker or bum, there is no in between. Oh and if you happen to see a the hard work side as better ,remember to help those that cant work(note I said cant,,not wont).
Now THAT would be called charity but see socialist want everyone broke and dependent on others.
Now are you a socialist or a capitalist? Do you want a good check and to spend/save/invest it wisely or just beg for money on corner?
I was thinking about this, and you know what, this has effectively happened already. In the past couple decades grade inflation has made it so that A is now the most common grade awarded in American post-secondary education. Now all you good Austrians out there would surely agree that inflation is, in some way, a form of taxation, no? The “A” of the really hard-working, brilliant student is devalued, and its value is transfered to others. The bulk of American students are probably beneficiaries of this practice, so guess what, it already happened, and the young Republicans themselves have benefitted.
Anyway, sorry to resurrect an old comment thread, but I think that deserves mention.
In a sense that is correct. However, no one has really benefited from this practice. When a grade is devalued, that means that the person who actually deserves an ‘A’ is not recognized as he should be. This is not a benefit. The other person who did not deserve the ‘A’ is not told where he should improve and therefore does not benefit either. So no one benefits by such a practice.
Bubbles always have winners and losers. The education bubble is no different.