In episode #35, part of the IDP podcast series "Economisto" on inequality, moderator Pedro Nery welcomes Sergio Guimarães Ferreira, PhD from UW-Madison and research director at the Institute for Mobility and Social Development, to discuss the topic of Social Mobility.
Meritocracy and social mobility are not the same thing.
During the podcast, Sergio emphasizes the need to understand that meritocracy and social mobility are distinct concepts that do not always coincide.
To illustrate this point, Sergio cites the situation of racial quotas for admission to public universities. Research shows that Black children of uneducated parents have only a 7% chance of obtaining a higher education degree, while white children in the same situation have a 14% chance. In this case, the application of racial quota policies can be defended against the dominance of meritocracy, as a tool to aid social mobility by guaranteeing a leap forward for Black children of uneducated parents.
In this case, a mechanism was created that restricts meritocracy in order to eliminate the difference in mobility between blacks and whites. This makes it clear that social mobility is not always equivalent to meritocracy and that in some cases it is necessary to prioritize one while restricting the other in view of a specific objective.
The ideal sought is a society in which equality and opportunity combine with the rule of merit, thus becoming, undoubtedly, fluid.
What is the situation in Brazil in terms of social mobility and meritocracy?
Sergio begins this discussion by commenting that most public policies and debates revolve around income transfer for minimum consumption and do not consider the distribution of opportunities. Studying the intergenerational mobility of an initial inequality makes it possible, for example, to simulate future inequality.
As a general rule, the poorest people are always the same in all countries. However, opportunities at birth are more unequal in some specific countries. It is important to identify and understand this pattern in order to dismantle the mechanisms that reproduce this social order.
The ideal is not maximum mobility or total equality, as merit is the essential social engine for growth and productivity. The competitive market is the best tool to induce merit based on impartiality and regardless of class. However, low mobility indicates low dynamism, little innovation, low economic growth, and unequal opportunities.
According to the interviewee, Brazil has a reasonable meritocracy, which does not mean, however, that we have mobility.
The effect of the absence of classes during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Another topic discussed during the episode was the possible effects and impacts of the absence of real-time classes during the COVID-19 pandemic. This measure was adopted to contain deaths through increased isolation, which meant the suspension of in-person classes. The question then becomes, "Did the impact of the social isolation period on knowledge acquisition affect poorer families more?"
Research on summer vacations (which last around 3 months) shows that students can lose, on average, the equivalent of one month of classes. Furthermore, the environment created by parents at home, whether intellectually stimulating or not, also directly interferes with this loss, being inversely proportional. If short periods can lead to negative consequences, the pandemic period will bring even more difficulties to be remedied.
Taking into account the aforementioned research and other variables such as environment, understanding, time and monitoring by parents, intellectual knowledge of parents to support their children, etc., the trend is that after the pandemic period educational inequality will increase, resulting in a worsening of intergenerational educational mobility, with the children of the poorest parents being statistically the most affected.
An increase in school dropout rates is also predicted, although high unemployment acts as a disincentive.
To mitigate the consequences, public policies and actions will have to be taken. Sergio presents three points that he suggests as appropriate measures for the moment:
1. Tests on the content taught during the distance learning period as a way to identify which students absorbed less and, therefore, take focused measures for them.
2. Development and implementation of after-school tutoring, especially for those who performed worse on the tests mentioned above.
3. Elimination of winter holidays and reduction of the summer holiday period;
Other topics covered in the episode
In the episode, Sergio also talks a bit about evidence-based public policies and also suggests some reading materials that contain interesting studies on the subject.
Like this?Listen to the Economisto podcast on your favorite platform or visit our website to listen to the full episode. clicking here.
