Equity Vs Equality


 "There is a big difference between equality and equity" - Kamala Harris (1)

Equality is that of opportunity or equality under the law. This is how most competitions and sports are governed and also the principle applied in Luke 19 when the nobleman gives an equal portion of money to each of his servants. When the nobleman returns he commends the servants who brought a positive return on his investment. It is also noteworthy that the nobleman rewards the servants in proportion to their success.
Equity is about equality of outcome. This is something you want in a production environment where you want each product (ie an airplane or a vaccine or even Krispy Kreme doughnuts) to be as good as the next. This provides stability. An example of this can be found in Matthew 20. The master of the house pays people to labor in his vineyards. He goes out throughout the day collecting more and more people to work his vineyard, and at the end of the day he pays them for their labor. To everyone’s surprise, each worker is paid the same amount regardless of when they started.
As the vice president said, there is a big difference between these two principles. And, when used in their proper settings, both can be beneficial, however, misapplying either principle can also have dire consequences.
During the lockdowns, special needs students suffered from equality when public schools sent their students home (2). The special needs students, who had been receiving special education, were given the same materials and resources as every other student. While the school may have won a participation trophy, they failed to achieve their most basic of goals: to effectively educate all of their students, even their most vulnerable ones.
On the equity side of things, Loudon county schools announced they were removing any advanced math classes prior to the 11th grade(3). This is an exact representation of the cartoon above. Rather than bringing everyone up to an advanced (and equal) math level, they have imposed a ceiling that keeps everyone down (but equal).
This policy will harm these students’ future prospects, when they have to compete with better prepared students for selective colleges or job opportunities?
Now, the good thing about both of these examples is that both are reasonably remedied. Both stem from the inefficiency and incompetence of government bureaucracy, and both issues have already been solved by private markets.
Homeschooling and private schooling exist to serve the needs of the student. If a student has special needs, then the teacher will adapt or even specialize in meeting those needs. Likewise when it comes to advanced math courses, there are any number of advanced math courses available through the internet. Some, like Khan Academy are even free (4).
So where does that leave us? Equity and equality both have their place and it is our responsibility to ensure they are used appropriately.

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