Organic disadvantages
Today I went to the mom and pop corner store by foot. One of the ten thousand corner stores in Mexico. The one that is closest to my house. Not one of the five thousand 7-eleven stores we have in every mid-to-big sized cities in Mexico, which are very conveniently placed on the opposite corner of the mom and pop corner stores. I try to support the small businesses, I always have and always will, despite being a corpo slave for Walmart for years half a decade ago.
Anyway, I went by foot because I decided so, not because I was forced because I don't have a car. I went to the corner store because I preferred the convenience that comes with a higher price instead of the cheap price that comes with farther distances. I chose to go there myself on a random Saturday morning because I had the time because I don't have to work on this day, unlike 90% of my country's population.
I left the store, savoring the recently bought salsa for my morning eggs and thinking about a new branding idea I've been playing with, and I stumbled upon an old man. This 55 year old man was dressed formally, but with worn out clothes and shows that saw their golden days 15 years ago. He stood proud of who he was while being fully aware of his situation: He was waiting for the bus, the transport way of the lower Mexican class, and only the lower class, preparing to start his one hour commute to work for 10 hours straight on a dead end job that barely pays the bills and remind him how shitty is his boss, how much he hates his life, and how unfair socioeconomic classes are in the 3rd world.
Of course he doesn't understand anything about socioeconomic factors in the 3rd world, and how the Mexican lower class or the proletariat as Marx would refer to, is so different to the proletariat in Germany. He just knows that being just above the poverty line in Mexico is probably the worst hand he could've gotten. It would've been better to be born in a marginal neighborhood or up in the mountain where people have no concept of money, but if they had they would know they were born, would live, and would die pennyless.
His life is a constant struggle, and he's never getting out of the rat race. He doesn't even know he's the main power source of the rat race. He's not even a rat, he's the food for the actual rats. And yet, he has a family and has something to live for. He wakes up every morning, finds energy God knows where, and battles through routinary, endless days that will continue his life cycle until he is not able to go to work, and he ends up being a burden for his children that may be able to support him. Odds are, he will die in misery, leaving a wife that has no way of supporting herself that will in turn become a burden for her children. She might has a better outcome though, because in Mexico, the mother is the most sacred person, both for men and women, so she might make it til she's eighty years old.
Disadvantages
I am not a communist. God forgive that. I am not even catholic, I just mention God because of routine. I am not a fan of open capitalism but I sure as hell would rather die standing than to live in a socialist state. I like meritocracy, but I understand that there are systemic disadvantages that render meritocracy obsolete.
Equality of opportunities, not equality of outcome. That's the idea, at least in paper, that I subscribe to.
I am up for small government, but I don't think there should be no government. But that government should not rule anything bigger than a small city, perhaps not even a town too big where two degrees of separation is not a thing.
I have no idea if that term exists. I know that the term six degrees of separation exists. If you don't know what that is, google it. Well no, duckduckgo it, do yourself a favor and never again use google.
But either way, meritocracy. I've been the biggest supporter of meritocracy since I am 12 years old, but perhaps I only support this form of self governance because I was born in a privileged position, I was able to develop my skills, nurture my intelligence, and enjoy the money my parents made. Perhaps I would be more of a socialist and less of a meritocratic person had I been born in the Mexican slums, which are called lost cities, where not even the police dares to enter unless a high profile murder happens.
Which takes me back to equality of opportunities, never equality of outcome.
Up to what point is this equality a feasible one in the third world?
In Germany or Norway this equality of opportunities might be real, but in Mexico, it is nonexistent.
There is an organic disadvantage in the current third world societies, and this will never stop being the biggest factor that determines the inequality of outcome for every lower class citizen.
But that is a matter I will discuss in my next post, hopefully tomorrow.
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Unfortunately this is just how it is :( until people wake up. Until govts stop being greedy in these 3rd world countries and wanna actually help to make their country to be better I think it will be difficult to ever have that equality you speak of in opportunities. I am in Malaysia right now and it's pretty much a disadvantage to be a chinese over a malay here. Not to be racist or anything but it's just a fact that if you're muslim/malay in malaysia you will have more benefits and opportunities. Malaysia has everything it needs to be a first world country; we have more resources than Singapore and look how Singapore is doing! Imagine if Malaysian govt stepped it up and stopped being greedy and close minded on their ideals. Malaysia could be great! and there's definitely many other third world countries that have the potential as well. Anyways enough with my rant :P have a great day Eric
Fact!
The price at corner shop are higher than far distance shops like walmat,
Fact!
In Nigeria, 95 are the proletarists which is different from your country people as they are different from Those in Germany, whose life cycle depend below a $1 per day and works throughout the lifetime for bosses on severe conditions. We suffers more despite our huge economic and human resources.
These are some interesting and important points you bring up. As a student of information and statistics around the world (and having lived in 12 countries across three continents) there invariably seems to be certain connections that combine to "make things how they are." A major factor often is the connection between the level of corruption (or PERCEIVED corruption) at the top end of a society and how well/badly a society's "working class" is doing. You mention Germany and Norway... and one of the commonalities there is also that the people in power — steering the ship, as it were — are less corrupt and corruptible.
Consider, for example, that in Norway a corporate CEO likely makes on the order of 15x the income of the hourly wage worker. At the same time, the broad level of faith in the government and "system" is very high. In Germany, that ratio is about 25-30x, and there's still a high level of trust in the system. Jump to the USA... still a "1st world" nation... and suddenly CEO jumps to 300x average worker pay, and meanwhile people have a considerable mistrust of government and the economic system. At the far opposite end of the spectrum — primarily Africa — government and the system is seen as utterly corrupt, and the gap between the "haves" and "have-nots" runs in the 1000x's... even though many of the nations have huge bases of wealth and natural resources.
Chicken vs. egg? Hard to say, but more likely we need to look at a culture of "community and INTERdependence" vs a culture of "individualism and radical self-reliance." Is it regional, as in all of Latin America has problems? Hardly. Why does Uruguay (and to a lesser extent, Chile) work, while others do not? No easy answers... but certainly an interesting discussion!
=^..^=
There are a lot of criteria that can determine how exposed one will be to some opportunities in one area compared to another.
Third-world country sure has loads of inequality existing within each jurisdiction. This is why anyone in this type of nation-state should find a way out, either to leave their nation-state or seek information which is probably online today to counter the inequality existing in his jurisdiction.
This is one of the problems that I think crypto, the internet and Ai are solving and will keep doing.
Information to counter inequality:
https://peakd.com/hive-153630/@atma.love/how-to-re-solve-most
😔speechless!!
Even not being among the poorest of people's, I always want to buy from the mom and pop stores, if I can. If I buy a dozen eggs from my neighbor who raises chickens, sure, the eggs may be different sizes and colors and varying degrees of cleanliness, but 100% of what I spent is still in my neighborhood. If I buy a dozen eggs from Walmart, how much of that purchase price is leaving my neighborhood? That's less dollars in my neighborhood, meaning less buying power between my neighbors. We become poorer, unless we find a way to bring those dollars back to the neighborhood.
That is probably the best action against the system, to stop participating in it. Supporting local businesses in cash when able, or buying stuff from your neighbors and so on, the less the government can meddle in what is your private business, the better.
People don't realize that buying from multinationals is making money flee the country, and of course they don't understand what this implies in the bigger scheme, but you want to keep money flowing and circulating locally, the more local, the better.
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I think the world would've been a much better place if it operated more on meritocracy. Those who've not been dealt a good hand at the start of their life journey are having more tools to change their perceived destiny for be better. But they first have to learn how to overcome the mental hurdles that they've accumulated all their life which has also dimmed their spark. The rat race is really soul crushing and can sap the life out of people.
Exactly, right now if you have a cellphone and some time at night, you can educate yourseld to a point where you can improve your quality of life. Of course this comes from someone who didn't have to work since being 6 years old and wasn't abused by their stepdad, so there are some exceptions where meritocracy doesn't work because the lower class, the really low class, is not equipped to support themselves in a meritocratic society because they don't have the psyque to do it.
It's hard, even a meritocratic society has disadvantages, some of them I have no idea how to solve or fix, and believe me I've given this a lot of thought. But in the end, meritocracy is the lesser evil.
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Yes! That's how I like to see it too. Everything has it disadvantages but finding a system will the least amount of disadvantages to the most amount of people is one of the best ways to build a promising future.
I think awareness plays an important part in removing some of the organic disadvantages that have a potential to be transformed when a shift in viewpoint occurs coupled with action taking. But it seems a good proportion are not ready for that. Whether it's intentional or not is something that's not clear to me yet.
Living in South Africa, the economic divide is massive. The majority of the country is impoverished.
I wish there was a better system that could benefit all, not just politicians and wealthy individuals.
I think smaller governance centre's is a good idea and should have individuals in power that are psychologically assessed before and during their tenure. Money and power do strange things to people.
That's the third world, man. I get it, being from Mexico is pretty much the same, you have an elite and upper class that lives in a completely different world than the average Mexican that survives off scraps.
Bitcoin wanted to change the status quo and give other people the chance to have a life outside of the system that pushes them back, but the status quo remained, only the people in charge changed. But crypto and those values are not dead, and it's only a matter of time until a system that works for the people comes out (could it be hive if it becomes massive?).
Small government is the solution for me as well. I'd love no government, but we as a species are just not ready for it.
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100%. As for Hive becoming the saviour, who knows, but somethings gotta give at some point. Cheers!
This article holds so much facts in it. I like that you used the 55 year old man as a case study.
Meritocracy would be a good option but the problem comes when its time to choose the best man for the job. It gets harder when everyone feels they merit the position.
ps: I hope you don't mind me asking why not Google? Why duckduckgo?
I agree, and that is why a meritocratic society should have unbiased, impartial metrics that cannot be tampered or rigged.
If facts don't care about feelings, then code doesn't care about race, religion or any other bullshit, just merit.
Google tracks everything you do and sells your information as a product to companies, there no privacy whatsoever and literally everything you do, say and interact with gets put into a database. DuckDuckGo doesn't do that.
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Oh amazing. Thanks for being this to my notice.