Liyah Lopez

English 1A

October 24th, 2017

Moore vs Meritocracy

Sitting in business class, I hear my peers connect the materials we learn to the Marketing

summer camp they attended or to what they remember their parents talking about from their

executive corporate position. Others contribute what they have learned from their accounting

courses at their high school. If theres a difficult concept, some resort to calling their parents who

have been in the business industry for 25 years. I, on the other hand, resort to google and talk to

my parents about everything Ive encountered in college, something they were never able to

experience themselves. Sitting in business class, I am held to a disadvantage. I was never able to

discuss the stock markets with my parents or discuss microeconomic theories with Bill Gates

son. Although I work hard, the experience and opportunities I have lacked will hold a detriment

against me. The idea of meritocracy is commonly heard when discussing sports and the

American Dream; If you work hard, you can achieve anything. However this statement goes not

consider the contributing factors to the effectiveness of hard work. In the memoir, The Other

Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates by Wes Moore, Moore addresses the idea that your

background can predetermine your fate. In Chris Hayes book, Twilight of the Elites: America

after Meritocracy, Hayes outlines the validity of meritocracy and the factors socioeconomic

upbringings play on its credibility. Through Hayes argument against meritocracy, the roles

socioeconomics and demographics play on the opportunities given to both Wes Moores in The

Other Wes Moore become evident as very few people achieve social mobility based on their

background.
 In many cases, the financial cost of college overwhelms the potential benefits of a college

degree. Coming from a high school where only 22% of my graduating class went on to a 4-year

university, I witnessed many students discontinue their education because financially, there was

no way they could attend. The Other Wes Moores mother, Mary, understood this first handedly

as her opportunities were cut short. Many of the generation before mine believed that maybe

they did, but they had the rug pulled from them by cuts in programs like Pell Grants or by the

myriad setbacks that came with the age of crack(Moore, 161). Mary was smart enough to attend

college, she had everything is took to get a higher education. The only factor holding her back

was her financial position and with the pull of the Pell Grant, the opportunities before her fell.

Mary deserved to go to college and she worked hard to give herself that opportunity. However,

because she could not afford college without the Pell Grant, she was unable to attend. Hayes

addresses this idea of unequal advantages in his book, There is no such thing as a level playing

field Theres always going to be some type of advantage(Hayes, 37). Mary could have work

just as hard as any other student, but if that other student was from a financially well-off

background, they automatically had the advantage. The challenge was not that Mary wasnt good

enough, the challenge was that her opportunities were limited and predetermined.

Through Marys experience and those similar to hers, the idea of money opening the door

for opportunity becomes more evident. In Wes Moores piece, we see the effect that money

carries on Wes educational advancement and can connect it to Hayes perception of merit and

its relevance to wealth. Moore states, My grandparents took the money they had in the home in

the Bronx, decades of saving and mortgage payments, and gave it to my mother so that she could

pay for my first year of military school (Moore, 96). Regardless of how the money was

obtained, that wealth was what gave Wes Moore the opportunity to attend military school,
further his education, and develop himself into a well-groomed person. This assists Hayes claim

that with wealth, comes meritocracy. Hayes displays this idea when he claims, The pyramid of

merit has to come to mirror the pyramid of wealth and cultural capital (Hayes, 54). This claim is

beyond just being able to afford good schooling, it goes on to address the connections you have,

your first hand-experience, and background that gives an advantage over other students. Merely

working hard will not get you as far as it would with the right connections and contingencies.

In the real world, everyone is born into a certain social class based off of their socio-

economic background which further decides the likelihood of your success in life. Realistically,

it is difficult to move from one class to another regardless of your meritocracy due to the

underlying advantages high social classes hold. Other Wes Moore is quick to realize the

disadvantages held against him and his chances of social mobility as he searches for a new job.

Moore states, A year after completing the Job Corps training, Wes realized the only consistency

in his employment of inconsistency. That, and the fact that none of these jobs paid over nine

dollars an hour(Moore, 144). Regardless of how hard Other Wes Moore worked to make more

of his financial situation, there were several factors constraining him. Hayes discusses the

concept of limited social mobility when he states, The Iron Law of Meritocracy states that

eventually the inequality produced by a meritocratic system will grow large enough to subvert

the mechanisms of mobility. Unequal outcomes make equal opportunity impossible (Hayes,

57). Through Hayes claim, we can see why it was so difficult for Other Wes Moore to advance

further in his work force, the odds were held against him from the beginning.

In The Other Wes Moore, the narrator Wes Moore experiences the structure of racial

class in South Africa. Colored was a concept created during the apartheid era to further isolate

the races-- coloreds received more privileges than blacks did. Not many more but enough to see
antagonism between the two groups. The lighter your skin was in apartheid South Africa, the

better off you were(Moore, 167). Hayes discusses the idea of perfect meritocracy in his

statement, In a meritocracy, people are not judged on the color of their skin, but on the content

of their character(Hayes, 51). He later addresses that perfect meritocracy will never be

attainable because our society does not allow it. This relates back to Moores quote about skin

color as it focuses on the idea that there will always be something