The basic failing of our society lies in our dogged belief that we as human beings should get only what we deserve, rather than what we need. This is the central dogma of the great glistening cathedral of twenty-first-century meritocracy and the fundamental lie at the heart of the American dream. We will continue to embrace this idea because doing

Those with whom I have discussed this project have often made exactly this mistake, assuming that because I think the ability to, say, do calculus is deeply influenced by genetics, I must view that kind of intelligence as the only kind that counts. That is entirely untrue. (For one thing, I can’t do calculus.) What I am arguing here is that the

To recognize that our abilities lie outside of our control would be to strike the hardest possible blow against meritocracy. For it is that belief in the universal availability of success that underpins our entire system; it is the logic that convinces us that our suffering is fair. Tell the truth to people and show them that the deck was stacked

Human beings are complicated creatures, and we can be ranked and measured and divided on a thousand metrics. To suggest that we will ever achieve equality of any meaningful kind is to deny our nature. Recognizing that we have fundamentally different abilities and talents does not curse people to a harsh existence. It is the first step in their

Most people will be productive because it is in our nature to be productive,

“human nature” (a construct whose boundaries are defined by whatever is convenient at the moment)

I do not want to police the boundaries of socialism. I do want to articulate a very basic criterion for what socialism is. Contrary to popular conception, socialists do not merely want the government to pay for things in an otherwise unaltered market system, such as happens with food stamps. Rather, for change to be socialist it must entail the

the basic assumption of a jobs guarantee is that work is good; the basic assumption of a UBI is that work is bad. Jobs guarantee people call work ennobling; UBI people call it degrading. (For the record, both are right in different ways.) When we contemplate a radical future, we literally don’t know if we want to save people from having to work a

This is my own objection to a universal basic income. It has the same problem that liberal social programs almost always do: it does nothing to strengthen the hand of the poor and working class relative to the rich, to the bosses, and to political leaders. Both the traditional American labor movement and communists define their central goal as