Hierarchy is common in nature. It helps animals avoid constant fights over food and mates. But in the wild, hierarchy is flexible—like software that quickly adapts to reality. For example, a wolf pack has an alpha wolf who leads hunts and settles disputes. But if this alpha loses a fight, another wolf quickly takes his place. The rank order can shift overnight.

Early humans were similar. Hunter-gatherer groups had fluid hierarchies that changed with their needs. Anthropologist Christopher Boehm found that early human groups used “reverse-dominance” to control overly aggressive leaders. If a leader became too bossy, the group teased, ignored, or even expelled him. Power moved freely, based on skill and fairness, not permanent status.

Understanding Two Types of Hierarchy

Here is a clear comparison of the two types of hierarchy humans have experienced:

Hierarchy Type	Flexible, Natural Hierarchy (Animals & Early Humans)	Fixed, Symbolic Hierarchy (Farming Age to Today)
How rank is won	Strength, sharing food, clear skills	Birth title, land ownership, caste, school degree, brand names
Can rank change quickly?	Yes. One lost fight and rank drops	No. Laws and traditions keep it fixed
Speed of change	Hours to months	Years to generations (around six generations)
Health effect	Short stress, quick recovery	Long-term stress, higher cortisol, shorter lifespan
Escape for lower ranks	Leave, form new groups, challenge leader	Debt, stigma, constant effort to prove worth

Nature’s Clear Warning: Fixed Rank Hurts Health

Biologist Robert Sapolsky studied baboons for more than 40 years and found something important: rigid hierarchies damage health. Low-ranking baboons who could not rise up had high levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Their immune systems weakened, and their cells aged faster (shortened telomeres). Interestingly, when a sudden disease killed the most aggressive baboons in one group, the remaining baboons formed a less strict hierarchy. Within months, the baboons’ stress levels improved dramatically.

Humans show the same patterns. Studies of British civil servants reveal that feeling stuck at a low rank increases the risk of heart disease, even more than having a low salary. Being locked into a low social position makes the body constantly feel threatened.

How Hierarchy Became Frozen: Four Key Steps

Human hierarchy became rigid because of four historical developments:

1. Storing Extra Food (Surplus)
   When humans learned to farm, grain and other foods could be stored. Stored food became property that families passed down. With inherited wealth, status separated from daily skill or merit.
2. Weapons and Force (Cheap Coercion)
   New technologies like metal swords, horses, and firearms allowed small groups to control many others easily. Leaders no longer needed daily approval or skill demonstrations; power could be enforced through threats and violence.
3. Symbols and Laws (Symbolic Abstraction)
   Writing, money, and religion codified rank into permanent laws. People began respecting symbols—like royal titles, coins, and sacred texts—as proof of rank and power, regardless of actual skill or fairness.
4. Social Approval (Network Effects)
   When enough people respect symbols—like a degree from Harvard or luxury brands like Louis Vuitton—everyone else feels forced to respect them too, even if these symbols no longer represent true ability or usefulness.

Together, these four changes transformed hierarchy from a flexible, useful system into a rigid social structure. Hierarchy stopped being a simple coordination tool and became something more like real estate—an asset passed down through generations.

Modern Evidence: The Ladder is Still There, Just Harder to Climb

Today, social mobility—people moving up or down in society—has slowed dramatically:

• Education: A major 2024 study showed wealthy American children (top 1%) are 77 times more likely to get into Ivy-League-level universities than poor children who have exactly the same test scores.
• Wealth: Studies in developed countries show that once a family reaches the top 10%, it usually takes at least five generations for their descendants to return to average income levels.
• Jobs: Roles that previously required only a high school diploma now often demand college degrees, trapping many young people in debt and limiting their upward movement.
• Hiring Practices: More than 70% of high-level jobs are filled through personal connections rather than open applications. Social networks matter more than skills or achievements.

All these facts show the same truth: society’s ladder hasn’t disappeared—it’s just bolted higher than ever, making it hard for most people to climb.

Experts Agree: Humans Added an Extra Layer That Froze Mobility

Several respected researchers from different fields see this problem clearly:

• Christopher Boehm explains that early humans kept their hierarchies fluid by actively resisting unfair leaders.
• Joseph Henrich highlights how humans developed an additional system of “prestige,” separate from physical strength or dominance, that became fixed through imitation.
• Pierre Bourdieu showed that subtle markers—such as accents, tastes, or the schools someone attended—became powerful tools to lock in social class.
• Gregory Clark and Raj Chetty used large data sets to show clearly that family names, wealth, and education status tend to remain stable across six generations or more.

All these scholars agree: natural hierarchy based on performance and fairness is normal. The human-created symbolic layer of titles, wealth, and degrees has frozen this hierarchy, blocking social mobility and trapping talented individuals at lower levels.

Time to Return to Natural Flexibility

The core mistake humans made was treating rank and status like precious beachfront property—something rare, fenced off, and passed down in families. Instead, we should treat status like fresh food: valuable when earned, but quickly spoiled if kept too long.

If we break apart this rigid structure, we can help society function naturally again. Removing unnecessary barriers would not just help talented poor people rise; it would relieve stress for everyone—including those at the top who constantly defend their positions.

Without fixing this, humans will continue paying a heavy price:

• Sapolsky’s “cortisol tax” on our bodies from endless stress.
• Bourdieu’s “cultural tax,” where certain people dominate society through small cultural signals.
• Chetty’s “generational tax,” as limited opportunities pass down from parents to children.

Nature clearly shows us that healthy hierarchies are flexible, fair, and always ready to adapt. By holding tightly to rigid symbolic ranks, humans have built walls around what was once a useful ladder. Now, we need to return that ladder to its natural state—open, movable, and fair. Only then can we thrive again, as nature intended.