You&#x27;re right, I didn&#x27;t fully understand your comment. I haven&#x27;t read Harrison Bergeron and didn&#x27;t realize he actually bit that bullet.<p>I agree that a mild form of status seeking exists (e.g. last place aversion), but I was taking issue with the strong form.<p>Personally, I don&#x27;t bite the bullet of extreme redistribution myself. There are a few forms of harmful signalling I&#x27;d favor taxing (e.g. educational certification) and a few forms of negative signalling I&#x27;d favor subsidizing&#x2F;regulating (e.g. mandatory paternity tests), but generally I think we just need to accept accidents of birth&#x2F;luck&#x2F;etc and should only apply minimal interference in extreme cases. I raise this more as a reducto-ad-absurdum than something I actually advocate.