> If we mean what we say about equal opportunity, then we're essentially talking about cutting the probabilistic link between one's background and one's distribution over outcomes.

The intrinsic problem with this approach is that it "drags others down", reducing the purpose of working harder or unfairly affects those more naturally capable.

> * Admitting students to university based on merely adequate grades and their citizenship in the community

Assuming you mean "citizenship in the community" to be "I live in state X, that means I have a better chance of access to X State University", over a generation, this would just mean that for higher achieving state X, students from state Y would be locked out of better opportunities based on geographic residency.

A real life example would be higher admittance for Californians to California State schools, which reduces the opportunities for a kid from Missouri or Alabama (because of realistic capacity constraints). The kid that went to University of Missouri is now at a significant disadvantage (based on education) and is not able to compete against her peers for jobs in regions with better long-term opportunities, even if she had a lot of potential. University of Missouri then has to accommodate the lackluster abilities of its enrolling body (as it ostensibly does with a 77% acceptance rate), which leads to dropping STEM requirements, which means an even less capable constituency.

> rather than based on a "meritocratic" competition that actually just conditions outcomes on starting-points.

Related to the last point, this would seek to normalize the achievement by "boosting up" those that haven't demonstrated aptitude, while limiting the opportunity of those that would benefit from a more rigorous program.

> * Supporting trade unions and other institutions that regularize wages/salaries/incomes.

For non-specialized labor, maybe. If the idea is that the base salary would need to increase, that would just increase the costs of goods "across the board", which doesn't do much except broaden the divide between the full-time employed and the unemployed.

Would you be willing to give up a percentage of your salary to someone else in your department that earns less, even if he/she doesn't work as hard or isn't as skilled? If yes, why aren't you doing that now?

> * Taxing inheritance heavily.

Why are others more entitled to the results of my labor after I'm dead versus when I'm alive? It's not my job to posthumously give advantage to the kids of strangers against my own in a competitive world. Also, if you try to implement this, you'll end up getting the government involved in interpersonal gifting (as the logical workaround would be to give the maximum tax deductible gift per year or sell assets to family at well below their value, if not just creating new avenues to tax avoidance).

> * Enforcing anti-trust law.

Agreed.

> We're looking to defy that natural process, cut a natural link, and thus regularize certain statistical structures.

This suggestion makes my brain feel fuzzy. If the thought is that it's a natural process for the above-average to create advantages for themselves and their own, isn't this asking for more laws to compel them to act against their own interests?