Anyone who takes responsibility for his own affairs and higher education has opportunities make millions in this country.
I grew up with very little, and nobody helped me worth a damn.
Posted on 04/26/2006 3:47:22 PM PDT by nicollo
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.
"In other words, the chances of getting rich are about 20 times higher if you are born rich than if you are born in a low-income family," he told an audience at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think-tank sponsoring the work.
He also found the United States had one of the lowest levels of inter-generational mobility in the wealthy world, on a par with Britain but way behind most of Europe.
"Consider a rich and poor family in the United States and a similar pair of families in Denmark, and ask how much of the difference in the parents' incomes would be transmitted, on average, to their grandchildren," Hertz said.
"In the United States this would be 22 percent; in Denmark it would be two percent," he said.
The research was based on a panel of over 4,000 children, whose parents' income were observed in 1968, and whose income as adults was reviewed again in 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1999.
The survey did not include immigrants, who were not captured in the original data pool. Millions of immigrants work in the U.S, many illegally, earnings much higher salaries than they could get back home.
Several other experts invited to review his work endorsed the general findings, although they were reticent about accompanying policy recommendations.
"This debunks the myth of America as the land of opportunity, but it doesn't tell us what to do to fix it," said Bhashkar Mazumder, a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland who has researched this field.
Recent studies have highlighted growing income inequality in the United States, but Americans remain highly optimistic about the odds for economic improvement in their own lifetime.
A survey for the New York Times last year found that 80 percent of those polled believed that it was possible to start out poor, work hard and become rich, compared with less than 60 percent back in 1983.
This contradiction, implying that while people think they are going to make it, the reality is very different, has been seized by critics of President Bush to pound the White House over tax cuts they say favor the rich.
Hertz examined channels transmitting income across generations and identified education as the single largest factor, explaining 30 percent of the income-correlation, in an argument to boost public access to universities.
Breaking the survey down by race spotlighted this as the next most powerful force to explain why the poor stay poor.
On average, 47 percent of poor families remain poor. But within this, 32 percent of whites stay poor while the figure for blacks is 63 percent.
It works the other way as well, with only 3 percent of blacks making it from the bottom quarter of the income ladder to the top quarter, versus 14 percent of whites.
"Part of the reason mobility is so low in America is that race still makes a difference in economic life," he said.
The best thing we could do for our poor is to teach them how to act rich.
Goiters
It fits that the author's name is "Alister Bull."
Bill Gates was born a poor black child.
"This debunks the myth of America as the land of opportunity"
So we should all become communists.
He's sure convinced me!
This is what is reported as news every day on British and New Zealand newspapers about the US.
Actually the American dream was never about amassing great wealth. It's about earning an honest living, buying a home and raising a family while being left alone.
Guess people like Oprah, Colin Powell, etc. don't count.
Alister Bull .....was this miss spelled?
"America's rags to riches dream an illusion."
Well, why not? The liberals have only worked 75 years trying to destroy the dream.
Don't tell them but it still happens everyday.
Hahahaha! Had to laugh, children born to wealth end up as
wealthy adults, it would take a liberal to have to do a study to find that out.
Define rich...
the idea that continental europe has more economic class mobility than the US is utter lies.
The Center for American Progress "sponsored" the work?
What other result would you expect than the one Hertz got?
I wonder if Hertz complains about drug studies sponsored by pharmaceutical companies.......
I'd like to see this "study."
In 1976 my net worth was $60 cash and a 1968 Pontiac Firebird. I also had a throw rug, a warm coat from Fingerhut, and an old milk box full of 8-track tapes.
That was my worldly possessions. All of them.
Today my net worth is well over $1,000,000.
Phttttt.
Work, save and work some more.
Can someone (anyone) please tell me what business the Federal Reserve has in producing this kind of research?
Does the Federal Reserve really have the mandate to "fix" the ills their (ahem) esteemed researchers discover in our society?
This pretty much sums it up. If you are born a kennedy , chances are you wil remain one, be rich from the trust funds and never have to earn a penny.
Wait: That isnt all you can get elected and tell all the poor and black folks how much you feel their pain and get elected and give them entitlements with government money while you keep your own.
Aint life grand?
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