Non-price inflation: When numbers lose all meaning

Grade inflation and title inflation can trap us in a new normal where perfection is the only path to success, and perfection itself has lost all meaning.

We hear the word “inflation” and think of prices (of food, fuel, medication, rent). But inflation’s reach goes far beyond markets, and can seep into how we measure worth itself.

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Titles, grades, even achievements may have started to expand more rapidly than substance. Think of college admission cut-offs and the trend becomes instantly clear. Let’s start there.

GRADE INFLATION: Straight As and a distorted reality

In my year, the Andhra state board Class 10 topper scored 546 on 600. With a score of 536, I ranked ninth.

Three decades on, this year’s Class 10 topper scored 600 on 600. Cut-offs for Delhi University often hover near perfection. Are students dramatically smarter, or have we tampered with the scale?

Grade inflation works the way price inflation does: when too many top scores are issued, the base shifts. In the same way that people become more willing to pay more for the same car, teachers, under pressure from parents, peers and superiors, grade a little higher. And presto, 95 becomes the new 75.

The effects are significant. Universities have no way to gauge excellence in a given field. Employers must design their own tests because the transcripts are all perfect and yet industry surveys show that only a small percentage of graduates are considered employable.

The signals of merit blur. Such inflation in education distorts learning, as students begin to game the system for grades.

It is troubling enough to think that Einstein failed an early entrance exam (providing hope to brilliant but struggling students everywhere). What does it mean when the likes of Satya Nadella and Sundar Pichai (based on their Class 12 marks) might not have made it to the first admissions lists today?

Grade inflation traps everyone in a new normal where perfection is the only path to success, and perfection itself has lost all meaning.

TITLE INFLATION: The promotion as an end in itself

LinkedIn today feels like a wonderland where everyone is a head or chief of something.

Grand-sounding titles proliferate because they are cheap to mint and make everyone feel richer, at least for a while.

It’s tempting to wonder what Mahatma Gandhi’s LinkedIn profile would have said. CMO for Chief Movement Officer? The thought itself reveals the absurdity. Titles say less about contribution than they do about hunger for status, and yet new terms are being coined every day.

It is easier, of course, for companies to hand out status. They needn’t alter the profile or responsibilities of an employee; they needn’t even raise their pay. The tag of Senior is handed out instead: the corporate equivalent of Monopoly money; bright, exciting, but ultimately worth very little on the market.

It’s worse than that. Title inflation can do real damage. Noise breeds confusion and cynicism. The more titles escalate, the less each one means. Besides which, when everyone’s a leader, who’s focused on the actual work?

WHAT GOES UP…

Whether in titles or marks, inflation begins with good intentions (encouragement, fairness) but ends with dilution. When we expand symbols faster than substance, they stop measuring what they are meant to measure. Meaning is eroded; trust is lost. Systems are damaged in the process.

Inflation everywhere plays the same quiet trick: it lets us feel we’re advancing while we’re mostly running in place.

The cure to this distortion isn’t deflation or cynicism, it is restoring direct links between reward and reality. A role should reflect responsibility; a grade should reflect understanding; and growth should mean more than bigger numbers on a piece of paper.

(Kashyap Kompella is a tech industry analyst and author of two books on AI. To read his essay on personal inflation, click here)