  Typically, merit is defined with respect to some intrinsic measure of worth.
We instead consider a setting where an individual's worth is \emph{relative}:
when a Decision Maker (DM) selects a set of individuals from a population to
maximise expected utility, it is natural to consider the \emph{Expected
Marginal Contribution} (EMC) of each person to the utility. We show that this
notion satisfies an axiomatic definition of fairness for this setting. We also
show that for certain policy structures, this notion of fairness is aligned
with maximising expected utility, while for linear utility functions it is
identical to the Shapley value. However, for certain natural policies, such as
those that select individuals with a specific set of attributes (e.g. high
enough test scores for college admissions), there is a trade-off between
meritocracy and utility maximisation. We analyse the effect of constraints on
the policy on both utility and fairness in extensive experiments based on
college admissions and outcomes in Norwegian universities.
