In episode #35, which is part of the series on inequality of the IDP podcast "Economisto", mediator Pedro Nery welcomes Sergio Guimarães Ferreira, PhD from UW-Madison and research director at the Institute of Mobility and Social Development to discuss the topic Mobility Social.
Meritocracy and Social Mobility are not the same thing
During the podcast, Sergio emphasizes the need to understand that meritocracy and social mobility are different concepts, which do not always coincide.
To exemplify this issue, Sergio brings up the situation of racial quotas for admission to public universities. Research shows that black people, children of uneducated parents, have only a 7% chance of obtaining a higher education diploma, while white people in the same situation have a 14% chance. In this case, the application of the racial quota policy can be defended to the detriment of the empire of meritocracy, as a tool to assist in social mobility by guaranteeing a leap forward for black children of uneducated parents.
In this case, a mechanism was created that restricts meritocracy in favor of eliminating the difference in mobility between blacks and whites. In this way, it becomes clear that social mobility is not always equivalent to meritocracy and that in some cases it is necessary for one to be prioritized while the other is restricted in view of an objective.
The desired ideal is a society in which equality and opportunity are combined with the empire of merit, thus becoming, surely, mobile.
What is the situation in Brazil in terms of social mobility and meritocracy?
Sergio begins this topic by commenting that most public policies and debates revolve around the transfer of income for minimum consumption and do not consider the distribution of chances. Studying the intergenerational mobility of an initial inequality makes it possible, for example, to simulate future inequality.
As a general rule, in all countries the poorest are always the same. However, the chances at birth are more unequal in some specific countries. It is important to identify and understand this pattern to be able 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 impersonality and regardless of class. However, low mobility indicates low dynamism, little innovation, low economic growth and unequal chances.
According to the interviewee, in Brazil we have a reasonable meritocracy, which does not mean, however, that we have mobility.
Effect of missing classes during the COVID-19 pandemic
Another topic discussed during the episode was the possible effects and impacts of the absence of classes in real time during the COVID-19 pandemic. This measure was adopted to contain deaths through increased isolation, which meant the cessation of face-to-face classes. The question then would be "Did the impact of the period of social isolation on the accumulation of knowledge affect poor families more"?
Research carried out on summer holidays (which last around 3 months) shows that students can lose, on average, the knowledge of 1 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 many more difficulties to be remedied.
Taking into account the aforementioned research and other variables such as environment, understanding, time and monitoring of parents, intellectual knowledge of parents to provide support to their children, etc., the tendency is that after the pandemic period, educational inequality will increase, which results in a worsening in intergenerational mobility of education, with the children of the poorest parents being statistically the most affected.
The increase in school dropouts is also a prediction made, even though the rise in unemployment is a disincentive to do so.
To mitigate the consequences, public policies and actions will have to be taken. Sergio brings three points that he suggests as appropriate measures for the moment:
1. Evidence of the content taught during the distance learning period as a way of detecting which students absorbed less and, thus, taking measures focused on them.
2. Development and application of after-school reinforcement, especially for those who performed worse in 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 little about evidence-based public policies and also recommends some reading materials that bring interesting studies to the topic.
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