The right and left tail of the distribution are not equal and offsetting here. The cost to society from one idiot is more than offset by the benefit of one genius. Therefore equality is not a desirable outcome. Optimizing the abilities of the right tail is.

I dont really think so. First of all, math geniuses are fighting among themselves for a few positions that allow them to actually use hard math. We produce more of them then we can reasonably use.

Second, teacher able to move kids up from "idiots" is actually saving us a lot of money.