Is America the new South Africa?

[KrazyHorse]

The most charitable explanation you might be able to make for the US's lack of economic mobility is that the US has been an opportunity society for so long relative to other countries that a sorting has taken place whereby people with the most advantageous inheritable traits are already sitting near the top of the income distribution while others are already sitting near the bottom.

A slightly less charitable view is that economic barriers to upward movement are higher in the US than elsewhere (for instance, in the existence of high-cost/high-status/high-utility private tertiary education) and that the US simply has a higher dispersion of incomes, meaning that movement across the distribution requires greater absolute changes in income.

[Arrian]

Well, by most measures economic mobility in the US is significantly lower than economic mobility in most European countries.

Ok, I'm curious. Can you point me to those measures?

-Arrian

[Imran Siddiqui]

Like say, a child of a single mother becoming President. That's been known to happen.

Twice in the last 3 Presidents even.

And yes, as Ozzy points out neither Clinton nor Reagan were blue-blood elites. Hell, neither was Carter, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, or Eisenhower for that matter.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Arrian


Ok, I'm curious. Can you point me to those measures?

-Arrian

http://www.americanprogress.org/kf/hertz_mobility_analysis.pdf

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Like say, a child of a single mother becoming President. That's been known to happen.

Twice in the last 3 Presidents even.

And yes, as Ozzy points out neither Clinton nor Reagan were blue-blood elites. Hell, neither was Carter, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, or Eisenhower for that matter.

Why are you attempting to discuss society as a whole by using people who by definition are exceptional?

[Heraclitus]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
non-economic (for instance, speaking with the right accent).

"Speaking with the right accent?"


If you are refering to the immigrants, then yes, but you can't deny that someone who speaks a Spanglish is discriminated against in the US just as much as someone speaking with a Bosnian accent in Slovenia.

[Heraclitus]

Are all you guys now ready to amdint KrazyHorse is right?

[rah]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


Why are you attempting to discuss society as a whole by using people who by definition are exceptional?

If you define anyone that is successful in moving up a class as exceptional.... then yes we are.

[Barnabas]

Class societies is what you see in Latin America, I think India too but I won't talk of them.

In Latin America you have the white descendants of conquistadores and colonial spanish burocrats on top, the mixed offspring of amerindians and spaniards in the middle, and amerindians as the lowest class, unless it is a country with many blacks like Colombia, there blacks have it even worse than amerindians.

In spite of that, many mestizos and amerindians have been presidents, even in the XIX century Mexico had an amerindian president, Benito Juarez, nowadays Evo Morales, an amerindian, rules Bolivia, and the last president of Peru, Toledo, was an amerindian too. But they tended to be the exception the last two centuries, now that is changing.

The only exceptions are Argentina and Uruguay, in Argentina all the democratic presidents since the 1950's have been sons or grandsons of poor european immigrants, and even many of the military dictators were also of the same background.

I may be wrong, but if I recall correctly, most USA presidents are of English descent, very wealthy, and are part of an elite which had ancestors at the time of the American independence. Kinda like blue blood families. I know some exceptions like Kennedy.

[Arrian]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


http://www.americanprogress.org/kf/h...y_analysis.pdf

Gracias.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Heraclitus


"Speaking with the right accent?"

[Imran Siddiqui]

It indicates somewhat of a lack of class society when even those of humble birth can lead the country.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by rah


If you define anyone that is successful in moving up a class as exceptional.... then yes we are.

What a ****ing strawman.

I said that a discussion of a whole society based on where some of its most exceptional members came from (i.e. the one in 30 million or so who become President) is silly. Then you take that to mean that anybody who changes classes is exceptional.

Think before you post.

[rah]

Almost every successful black athlete came from a lower social group.

All the techno geeks that became wealthy during the dot.com splurge.

The list goes on and on.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
It indicates somewhat of a lack of class society when even those of humble birth can lead the country.

It indicates that there are probably not serious legal impediments to high achievement. It does not say anything about the level of opportunity available to any but the extremely select few (as I said, the one in 30 million or so who don't become President).

Do I doubt that somebody with an IQ of 140 and a strong work ethic can achieve great things in the US? No. But these people can achieve great things in almost any modern society. That has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. It is a lazy, boring commonplace.