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Notes -
HBD is not just about intelligence. And, no, I don't mean distance running or altitude breathing; I mean other mental traits.
Intelligence is easy mode, both because we have a test to measure it (IQ testing is the single most successful result in psychology) and because it is easy to say that someone should not be penalized just for being born dumb if they are morally praiseworthy in other areas; that the kind, hardworking janitor still deserves respect and a good life even if he still counts on his fingers. That is, indeed, a core socialist argument for why CEOs should not get paid much more than unskilled labor.
Bur, of course, HBD is also about conscientiousness (or executive function, or grit, or whatever the hell they are calling it now), and propensity to violence, and time preference, and so on. It's another thing entirely to say that a lazy, violent janitor deserves the same good life and social admiration as a CEO. But the shape of the argument is exactly the same. Therefore, proves too much.
The beliefs (all of those traits are genetic to a degree) and (we should punish [broadly defined] some of them but not others) aren't contradictory. It all comes down to what you hope to achieve when you punish (or fail to reward) something. You can't punish someone for having low innate intelligence and expect them to get smarter. You can, however, punish someone for being violent and actually expect them to be less likely to choose violence.
Of course, the effect of high iq can be duplicated through other means, to a degree: A person who is dumber can often achieve the same things as someone who is smarter, but with more effort, so by paying some highly skilled profession X and paying some less skilled profession X-Y, you're increasing the likelihood that someone will either go into the skilled profession by using relatively much smarts and relatively less grit, or by using relatively much grit and relatively less smarts.
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