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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Thursday, April 27, 2006

Aristocracy not Meritocracy

Just another one of those, what's wrong with America posts.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - America may still think of itself as the land of opportunity, but the chances of living a rags-to-riches life are a lot lower than elsewhere in the world, according to a new study published on Wednesday.

The likelihood that a child born into a poor family will make it into the top five percent is just one percent, according to "Understanding Mobility in America", a study by economist Tom Hertz from American University.

By contrast, a child born rich had a 22 percent chance of being rich as an adult, he said.

posted by mikevotes at 7:22 AM

4 Comments:

  • And if the Repubs are successful in eliminating the Estate Tax (which is not bloody likely, I'd say!), a child born insanely filthy rich will have close to a 100 percent chance of being rich as an adult - even if he has no education or job skills.

    Today, you'd have to have a powerful and connected ex-President for a father to pull off this feat!

    By Blogger seenos, at 10:14 AM  

  • I agree. They might've gotten the total estate appeal in late 2003, but they wanted to put it off throughthe 2004 election.

    The weird thing is the current law is a sunset law over ten years where it's going down by x % every year, so in the last year of the current law it will be extremely tax efficient for the wealthy to die before the rates snap back to previous levels.


    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 11:41 AM  

  • I saw this story too and wasn't really surprised. As you say in the description at the top of your blog, "this is not the America I was brought up to believe in."

    By Blogger Kathy, at 1:09 PM  

  • Yeah, but actually it is the America I was brought up in. I'm an idealist about these things. Although this is awful and should be addressed mainly because it would make the nation stronger, I do draw a line between isuues like this that have been wrong a long time, and issues like torture which have been made far worse.

    This does need to be dealt with, but the fact that we're going backward on torture/civil liberties and regressive tax policy is something I'll fight harder.

    Hope that makes since. Longstanding issue, should be resolved for the strength of the country, but I'm more worried about the rapidly deteriorating issues.

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 6:20 PM  

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