Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by Jtsummers 3044 days ago
Equality of outcomes, typically, means very near equal income, access to resources, etc. in adult life. Regardless of their aptitude, skill, or individual choices, or even the work they do. It's a pipe dream because there's no feasible way to achieve it.

Equality of opportunity means we aim to provide everyone access to the same chances. Reduce the (present and historic) systemic discrimination by race and gender. Improve access to the basic tools required to achieve success (education and mobility). But we cannot guarantee that everyone will turn out the same (either by choice, fortune, or misfortune it just won't happen). It may still be a pipe dream, but it's far more achievable.

1 comments

>Reduce the (present and historic) systemic discrimination by race and gender.

How will you do this and how will you measure the results of the attempts to do this without measuring the outcomes of your attempts to do this?

Why wouldn't you measure the outcomes? You have to. What you don't ask for, though, is that all outcomes be equal, because it's a fundamentally absurd proposition.