The wizarding world is not living up to its potential. :)
Which gets to the interesting question of what the wizarding world owes to muggles. Giving muggles what gwern thinks they should get would be a tremendous amount of work for wizards—and either they force a lot of forgetting, and maybe enough isn’t possible, or they radically change their society, which they like as it is. And they might be right that they’d risk serious persecution. It is certainly the case that they would suffer ridiculous persecution. They’d be chased by paparazzi—isn’t Rita Skeeter enough?-- and harassed by wannabees.
Eh, if they’re worried about overwork, the free market will sort that out. As for their society—the Amish are awful insular. Orthodox Jew sects can be insular, as well as Mormon groups. It’s not hard to seal yourself off quite well in the modern world, and given that even your most mediocre Hogwarts graduate could command millions (it’s magic, after all) they can afford excellent security.
I don’t doubt that wizards could make up a ton of plausible-sounding excuses to maintain their apartheid.
You were describing (some part of?) what you think the wizards owe to muggles in order to maximize utility—you weren’t just saying that the wizards should integrate into muggledom.
The wizarding world is not living up to its potential. :)
Which gets to the interesting question of what the wizarding world owes to muggles. Giving muggles what gwern thinks they should get would be a tremendous amount of work for wizards—and either they force a lot of forgetting, and maybe enough isn’t possible, or they radically change their society, which they like as it is. And they might be right that they’d risk serious persecution. It is certainly the case that they would suffer ridiculous persecution. They’d be chased by paparazzi—isn’t Rita Skeeter enough?-- and harassed by wannabees.
The help/reward ratio reminds me of The Marching Morons.
Eh, if they’re worried about overwork, the free market will sort that out. As for their society—the Amish are awful insular. Orthodox Jew sects can be insular, as well as Mormon groups. It’s not hard to seal yourself off quite well in the modern world, and given that even your most mediocre Hogwarts graduate could command millions (it’s magic, after all) they can afford excellent security.
I don’t doubt that wizards could make up a ton of plausible-sounding excuses to maintain their apartheid.
You were describing (some part of?) what you think the wizards owe to muggles in order to maximize utility—you weren’t just saying that the wizards should integrate into muggledom.
I think that they’re not in a situation where there are no Pareto-improvements to be had. Both sides can win.