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There's a few ways to look at the data. One is that it's harder to move to the top quintile in America than some other countries, and people perceive it's much
by kbenson 5y ago
There's a few ways to look at the data. One is that it's harder to move to the top quintile in America than some other countries, and people perceive it's much easier than it in in America compared to those places.
The other is that it's much easier to get out of the lower quintile in America than those same countries.
There's a couple reasons that might be. One is that social mobility is actually higher in America, but there's a ceiling over which it's hard to overcome unless you're born there. Whether that ceiling is immediately under the top quintile or somewhere lower is an interesting question.
Edit: as pointed out, I actually misread the first graph, which is probability of remaining in lowest quintile. So, yeah, data looks like all bad news to me (unless you count those people knowing fairly accurately how fucked they are as a good thing).
- Rexxar 5y ago> The other is that it's much easier to get out of the lower quintile in America than those same countries. That's not what the first graph shows. What you say is true for "perceived" mobility, not for effective mobility. 33% of Americans stay in bottom quintile, much more than other countries.
- kbenson 5y agoActually, yeah, that graph is for probability or "remaining" which I missed. Thanks for the heads up.
- ummonk 5y agoEven beyond that, interpreting financial mobility is a tricky thing. For example, countries that have had high levels of meritocracy in the past may exhibit less financial mobility because people are already sorted into their merited economic brackets.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y agoHow can "merited economic brackets" span generations?
- Jensson 5y agoGenes. Of course people like you don't believe in genes, but it explains most things we see here. It is really hard to make poor people successful even if you give them resources, a top 10% childhood is extremely cheap compared to how much society derives from those, if it was that easy then Governments would already mass produce those. 70 years ago college was only for the elite. Today close to half of young adults go to college. Yet that didn't fix anything.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y agoWhat's a "person like me" ? What do I believe? Or not believe?
- popcube 5y agoI guess this is because we do not have blue blood:(
- Jensson 5y agoThe answer to your comment is obviously genes, so the only reason anyone would write in such a comment is that they reject that explanation. Blank slate people are always everywhere in threads like this.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y agoWrong. Just below is my response to someone else, and the point there is just as relevant as here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29537081 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29537081
- ummonk 5y agoCulture / upbringing tend to be passed on to some extent from one generation to the next, unless every child is raised in state boarding schools. And on the innate side, whether one hits the genetic lottery is correlated with whether one's parents and grandparents hit the genetic lottery.