
U.S.A., Land of Limitations? - kareemm
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/opinion/sunday/nicholas-kristof-usa-land-of-limitations.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share
======
eigenvector
I have said this to so-called progressives until I am out of breath. Class and
economic inequality is the most pervasive and dangerous form of inequality
facing us today in the rich world. We dwell on forms of inequality that are
broadly ostracised and largely eliminated, while the elephant in the room is
economic inequality that our business and political leaders endorse as
enthusiastically as Confederate leaders embraced slavery.

Many people today believe that the poor deserve their lot in life, just as
people would have said about African-Americans a century ago. Presidential
candidates and senators say it openly and without rebuke. Both houses of
Congress are controlled by people who talk euphemistically of the super-rich
(who increasingly derive their wealth from inheritance not ingenuity) as "job
creators". Meanwhile anywhere from a quarter to a third of our population is
languishing with no jobs or shitty jobs, poor health, broken families and is
always one parking ticket away from financial ruin.

This is the greatest challenge of our generation. We have to fix this.

~~~
EdSharkey
You said many people today believe that the poor deserve their lot in life. I
think the people who believe that are ignorant or indifferent or both.

However, an ugly bit about the poor that no one wants to confront is culture.
What is to be done about the culture of the poor that locks them in poverty? I
don't think throwing more money and resources at the poor helps -unless- it is
somehow coupled with culture change.

Wasting money/health on cigarette smoking and booze and drugs, credit debt and
payday loans and living paycheck to paycheck, dropping out of school, lotto,
endless streams of chaotic drama-filled relationships and unprotected sex and
babies outside of marriage, junk food and fast food and drinking pop instead
of water at every meal... These things to me aren't -only- an education
problem, they're -also- a culture problem.

It's judgey for a well-to-do guy like me to talk this way, sorry in advance. I
just find this culture thing very depressing because I don't feel there is
much that can be done. It's very tempting for me to pick a single group to
blame, like the banksters (especially re: payday loans) for being the secret
hand in causing all this. But in my heart, I know the culture of the poor just
really sucks in America, and there's a lot of wasted human potential. Nothing
is being done to change that culture based on what I see on the boobtube.

If you ask me, the victimhood status we confer upon the poor only serves to
lock them in their place. The greater society could do well by shaming bad
behavior and try to steer poor culture people onto better paths.

~~~
marcoperaza
This is the big mistake that the left makes in their thinking about poverty.
They believe it's a fundamentally material problem. In fact, the material
outcome is just the end-result of the real underlying causes: poor education,
broken families, and other cultural dysfunction. There's obviously a feedback
loop between material poverty and cultural problems, but you can't break the
cycle by just throwing money at people.

We can't forget about historical injustices such as slavery and Jim Crow. The
nation has a moral duty to especially help those communities. But what we're
doing now, spending billions of dollars on dozens of anti-poverty handouts, is
clearly not working.

I agree that the politics of victimhood is especially damaging. It robs the
poor of their agency and sells them the lie that the only thing between them
and prosperity is oppression by the rich. It's a politics of helplessness and
envy.

A man who does not believe that he is master of his own destiny cannot thrive.
When he is sold a life of dependence, he is made a serf.

~~~
legulere
> but you can't break the cycle by just throwing money at people.

At least for those where money is currently the hindering factor you actually
can. Financing students for example.

You also reduce the feedback loop to which you alluded. There are lots of
factors where it might not be that obvious that it exists. Stress factors like
poverty can greatly reduce mental capabilities for instance.

And in the end you make the lives of the poor people suck less with that
money.

~~~
marcoperaza
Financing students is a great example of how government ends up getting it
wrong. In the US, we finance college students with grants and subsidized
loans. But rather than making college affordable, this aid has had just the
opposite effect by driving tuition up across the board. Flush with public
money, colleges have become wasteful bureaucracies that are unaccountable to
their customers, students and parents.

But once an entitlement exists, it's almost impossible to take it away. As
Reagan said, "The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this Earth
is a government program". So it just becomes a permanent structural deficiency
of our society.

~~~
dragonwriter
> In the US, we finance college students with grants and subsidized loans. But
> rather than making college affordable, this aid has had just the opposite
> effect by driving tuition up across the board.

Increasing price (outside of aid) isn't actually the opposite of the effect
aid is intended to have -- subsidies always increase the cost before subsidy;
the intent is that they will decrease the cost after subsidy for those
receiving the subsidy since, under most reasonable supply/demand conditions,
the amount of increase will be less than the amount of the subsidy.

And this would probably work fine for grants taken alone, but we can't really
isolate the impacts.

Loans, however, aren't subsidies, they are cost-deferment measures. They
aren't meant to make college more affordable (in terms of lower net cost after
the policy) for those who get them, they are meant to allow people who could
not afford college up-front but who would benefit economically from college so
that college would be affordable if it could be paid for on a deferred basis
can afford it.

College loans, however, are problematic because humans (in general, and those
younger than mid-20s in particular) tend to be irrational and to -- as has, I
believe, been shown in numerous studies -- overly discount deferred costs, so
that loans have the _effect_ of subsidies on near-term costs while at the same
time just being deferred costs. So they increase the pre-policy cost without
_actually_ being a subsidy to those who qualify for them.

~~~
marcoperaza
Subsidized loans _are_ subsidies, in the form of 0% interest when you're in
school and very low interest rates after. Those both cost the government a lot
of money that the borrower would otherwise pay.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Subsidized loans are subsidies

They are subsidies on the cost of borrowing money, but not on tuition (except
at a very small ratio); but they act (in terms of effect on tuition prices,
for the reasons discussed in my previous post) like a much larger direct
tuition subsidy. because of this, it is much more likely that loan subsidies
have a perverse effect on affordability than grants.

------
anindyabd
> "We like to boast of America as a land of opportunity, and historically
> there is truth to that"

I keep hearing this, but where is the evidence? Was there any objective
research done to figure out whether at any point there was _really_ some sort
of magnificent economic mobility in the U.S.? There's lots of anecdotal
evidence, sure -- stories of people who immigrated here with nothing and made
it big, movies, novels, etc... but how do we know we're not just hearing about
the exceptions, and that in the vast majority of cases, which do not capture
people's imaginations, the poor stayed poor and the rich stayed rich?

~~~
watwut
Germany, for example, had officially recognized nobility till 1919. There were
official classes and you could not become military officer or government
bureaucrat if you was not born in the right family. First German experiment
with democracy and equality under law was after WWI and failed spectacularly.

America, with democracy and no nobility laws was rightfully called land of
opportunity compared to that.

~~~
saiya-jin
that's 100 years old history, and true. now let's talk about these times...

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Well, let's stop at 70-year-old history on the way. At the end of WWII, the US
had _not_ been bombed nearly into oblivion, had _not_ had large fractions of
its population killed off, and had _not_ been occupied (or ruled) by
psychopaths trying to kill off everyone who wasn't like them. In the US, you
could spend your time trying to build the future instead of trying to rebuild
from the damage of the past. You also could live your life with less fear of a
return of the days of killing. So, yeah, that looked a lot like opportunity in
those days.

Today? That's less clear cut, I agree.

------
nhebb
Aside: I met Rick Goff when I was in high school. My dad lived in Yamhill and
was friends with him. One day we drove out to his place, turning off the
gravel road toward a barn. Stepping inside the barn was a surreal experience.
There, out in the middle of nowhere, in a fucking barn, was a freshly painted
1950's Rolls Royce. It was beautiful.

I don't know if he's a good example of the economic class divide, though. I
understand Kristof's larger point and that he's writing from his own life
experiences, but I think Goff's situation is more demonstrative of the rural-
urban economic divide than a class divide.

He had a skill that people were willing to pay him for, but he chose to
restore cars out in the country, in his barn. I can't speak for Goff's life
choices, but during my summers in Yamhill and having relatives that lived in
rural areas, I met a lot of people who would rather eke out a meagre existence
in the countryside than move to where the jobs are. Part of economic mobility
is just plain mobility.

------
CamperBob2

       Rick acknowledged that he had made bad choices. He 
       drank, took drugs and was arrested about 30 times. But 
       he also found the strength to give up alcohol when he 
       felt he was turning into his father. What distinguished 
       Rick wasn’t primarily bad choices, but intelligence, 
       hard work and lack of opportunity.
    

If you were arrested 30 times, I'm going to guess that bad choices are, in
fact, one of the primary distinguishing characteristics of your life. There
are a lot of poor people with backgrounds ranging from unexceptional to tragic
who haven't been arrested once.

This doesn't invalidate Kristof's larger point, of course, but it does mean
he's not very good at picking reasonable, actionable examples. Short of taking
away Rick's free will, _Clockwork Orange_ -style, there may not be much we
could have done for him. I disagree that Rick's life story invalidates the
"American Dream," or even calls it into question.

------
rayiner
My wife was listening to Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence
People," a book written in 1936 aimed at sales and business people. One thing
that struck me was a chapter where he talks about empathizing with people. He
gives the example of Al Capone. If we had been born with Al Cappne's body and
mind and his circumstances, we would have been him. Therefore, people deserve
very little credit for what they've accomplished and conversely very little
discredit for what they've not. He ends the section with the saying "there but
for the grace of God go I."

It's interesting because the intended audience of the book was not social
progressives. It seems like a concept that wouldn't have been controversial at
the time. It rings very differently in today's culture, where we like to talk
about choices more than circumstances.

~~~
gozo
You might be interested in this ted talk, it touches upon this subject 6+
minutes in, but the whole thing is interesting.

[http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_ph...](http://www.ted.com/talks/alain_de_botton_a_kinder_gentler_philosophy_of_success?language=en)

------
lordnacho
It's very hard to get even not particularly wealthy middle class people to see
this. People have very aggressive in debates with me about how hard they
worked and how they should be allowed to pass their advantages on to their
kids. There's also an oft repeated trope about how it's about values and
character, which isn't entirely false, but besides the point.

It seems to be a basic human bias; we think everything positive that happens
to us is due to our own merit, and everything bad is due to circumstance. In a
country like the US, where I'm guessing people don't really mingle, you end up
getting some very bitter people who either think they are being pulled down by
the rabble or they are being held down by the aristocrats.

~~~
saiya-jin
> It seems to be a basic human bias; we think everything positive that happens
> to us is due to our own merit

not all, but if one decides to move for work and opportunities, giving up
close family, many friends, various safety nets that they bring (financial,
personal etc.), start from 0, working hard relentlessly and then is successful
(whatever that means), then coming back and listening some envious BS talk
about privileged/lucky/whatever by people who eat junk food not because they
have to, sit their evenings in front of TV consistently, never ever considered
learning something in their (massive) free time etc. They started on +- same
level, have same internet as me.

Do you really blame anybody successful? I don't. I want to give back, and I am
doing that. But not to random Joe, but to my dearest - family and friends. If
everybody does that, the very few truly unlucky remaining can be dealt
generously with state social systems.

This is what made US so famous and strong in past - that your success won't be
averaged with those that don't break a sweat, your success will be yours. And
more you work on it, bigger it might be. Remove this incentive, and many very
bright people will steer their energy elsewhere, and humanity gains less.

------
WalterBright
On the other hand, it's never been easier to:

1\. get educated 2\. start a business 3\. access the global marketplace 4\.
invest

~~~
WalterBright
Given the downvotes, I'm curious. Does anyone care to dispute the correctness
of any of the 4 claims?

~~~
mitchty
Not until you demonstrate that they are correct. Hard to dispute platitudes.

I'll start, that first one regarding education. Is it easy to learn now with
the internet? Sure, undoubtedly true. Is that measurably better than before
for any person? Probably not. Cost per semester hour at a college I went to 10
years ago, is over four times as high now.

That is just the first bullet point. I tend not to even consider the rest if
the first point is so... out of touch might be the best way to phrase it.

~~~
WalterBright
As I pointed out in another reply, a higher percentage of Americans have
college degrees than ever before.

~~~
makomk
Because you basically need a college degree to have a decent chance of getting
a job at above the minimum wage. Semi-skilled labour in places like factories
has gone and isn't coming back and jobs that didn't used to require a degree
are demanding them because why the hell not?

~~~
WalterBright
Something like 28% of American adults have college degrees.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States)

0.8% of Americans over 25 are earning minimum wage.

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2014/01/30/almost...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2014/01/30/almost-
everything-you-have-been-told-about-the-minimum-wage-is-false/)

That leaves 70% of American adults do not have college degrees and are earning
above minimum wage. Of course, depending on how one defines things those
numbers can go up and down, but it's not a stretch to say that most workers do
not have college degrees and earn above minimum wage.

One last observation - starting your own business does not require a college
degree. (Probably the most famous of those is Microsoft, and Microsoft has
hired programmers without degrees.)

~~~
vacri
That you quoted the percentage of total population rather than the percentage
of total workers suggests that you're trying to spin-doctor. The same link
calls $9.50 "well over" the minimum wage of $7.25... conveniently ignoring
that $9.50/hour is _still a shit wage._ That link clings to the literal
minimum wage like a limpet - notice how it never tells us the numbers of
people barely above minimum wage? Earn $7.50/hour? Well you're too well off to
be part of those statistics...

The author then has the gall to accuse others of using selective statistics to
make their argument, and even throws out the 'class warfare' canard.

~~~
WalterBright
I did believe I was accounting for spin doctoring by increasing the 0.8% to
20% when I acknowledged different definitions and said "most".

~~~
vacri
Your link that you are taking as minimum wage doesn't account for people
trivially above minimum wage. Yes, 'most people earn above minimum wage', but
that's not the spirit of the discussion - someone earning 25c/hour more than
minimum wage is still earning a crap wage. There are significantly more people
on a crap wage than "the numbers go up and down a bit from 0.8%".

Similarly, that link only takes the federal wage into account - of course it's
going to be abnormally low, given there are states with higher minimums. For
example, Washington state has a minimum wage of $9.47/hour. A minimum wage
worker in Washington won't show up in a study claiming $7.25 is the minimum
wage.

Also, where do you mention 20%?

~~~
WalterBright
"Most" means >50%. 70 - 50 = 20

~~~
ectoplasm
If it's such a small number of people, is there a problem with substantially
increasing the minimum wage?

------
elchief
This was also true when i took Economics of Inequality at university in 1997.
Western Euro countries and Canada were ahead of America back then. From an
outsider's perspective, if you're gonna make it rich, do it in the USA to make
it crazy rich, but you're going to have a hard time making it from the bottom
10th to the top 10th.

~~~
Joeri
So, you should leave the US to become rich, then return to turn that wealth
into superwealth?

~~~
elchief
If you can swing it, sure

------
known
[http://www.businessinsider.com/social-mobility-is-a-myth-
in-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/social-mobility-is-a-myth-in-the-
us-2013-3)

------
raceyT
Why didn't Kristof help this guy? It's not a systemic failure when a
congenital alcoholic ruins his life, it's a human one.

------
comrade1
I'd be interested in the stats in the other direction - how low of a chance of
someone born in the upper quintile ending up in the lower quintile. The u.s.
seems to be disproportionally high in mediocre people being at the top, being
there through famil money.

Basically britain's upper class twits satirized by Monty Python.

~~~
dlg
Brookings, a center-left think-tank, has a pretty good summary of a lot of
stats about income-mobility
[http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Research/Files/Reports/2008...](http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Research/Files/Reports/2008/2/economic%20mobility%20sawhill/02_economic_mobility_sawhill_ch1.PDF)

(Also, a shorter note from the center-right AEI
[https://www.aei.org/publication/tracking-the-same-
households...](https://www.aei.org/publication/tracking-the-same-households-
over-time-shows-significant-income-mobility/))

------
itistoday2
Basic Income.

------
Aoyagi

      ?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share
    

Please, don't do that.

As for the article itself, I thought it's common knowledge that in most
civilized world, social mobility is decreasing and income gap is increasing.

