{"id":5571,"date":"2022-09-03T15:45:47","date_gmt":"2022-09-03T20:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/?p=5571"},"modified":"2022-09-03T15:45:47","modified_gmt":"2022-09-03T20:45:47","slug":"new-germinate-startup-empowers-students-to-buy-sell-grades","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/2022\/09\/03\/new-germinate-startup-empowers-students-to-buy-sell-grades\/","title":{"rendered":"New \u201cgerminAte\u201d Startup Empowers Students to Buy & Sell Grades"},"content":{"rendered":"

Free-market enthusiasts rejoice! A group of University of Chicago students recently announced a new startup, germinAte, which allows students to buy and sell individual grades in courses. Co-founders Andrew Smith and Saul Alivisatos bill the service as a uniquely UChicago solution to a universal problem. \u201cLet\u2019s say you have a 3.4. You\u2019re almost in the running for the good internships, but not quite\u2014you have to get over that hump. Another student, meanwhile, has a 3.9 and more A\u2019s than she knows what to do with. So, let\u2019s say you get a B+ in Sanderson\u2019s macro course, while this other student gets an A in TAPS. We allow you to \u2018germinAte\u2019 your future, exchanging your B+ for her A, facilitated by a nominal cash transfer. Everyone benefits.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Critics of the service say that by allowing wealthy students to purchase better grades, germinAte not only cheapens the value of a UChicago diploma, but fosters elitism and widens the gap between rich and poor students. The founders, however, are undeterred. \u201cThis is a good thing for inequality. It\u2019s actually redistributing wealth. With disadvantaged students getting these grades for free, and selling them to wealthy students at a substantial markup, the service represents a net inflow to underprivileged students and a new way for them to get compensated for their labor. You can\u2019t call yourself a liberal and oppose this. We\u2019re like the modern-day Marx and Engels.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

At press time, FIJI was reported to be considering a seven-figure investment in the service, calling it \u201cfar superior to our current system of just paying the poor kids to take the classes for us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThis is a good thing for inequality. It\u2019s actually redistributing wealth… We\u2019re like the modern-day Marx and Engels.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":425,"featured_media":5572,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5571"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/425"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5571"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5575,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5571\/revisions\/5575"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}