This type of division is exactly what The Bell Curve was written about 20 years ago. The predictions in it have panned out 100%. The Left managed to demonize the book by making it racist, which it absolutely wasn't.
For the last 50years, and increasingly so and at a faster rate over the last 20or so, there has been little economic demand for those with less than average capability. Call it IQ or whatever you choose.
Therefore, as our society is presently constructed, there is little or no place for them in society. To be fully productive and in demand in the economy probably requires an additional IQ point every one or two years.
IOW, a cohort of perhaps 1% of the population falls out of society every year or two. And the rate is increasing.
While the "social safety net" will probably keep such people from starving, there is no place for them in society and no way for them to earn self-respect and that of others and live a meaningful life.
Despite this being far and away the greatest economic and social challenge of our time, absolutely nobody, liberal or conservative, is discussing what to do about it.
THE WORLD IS CHANGING.
We cannot go back to the beloved past (never really existing) utopias of either the right or the left.
Personally, I can see little to disagree with in the article aside from the unexamined assumption that more money handed out in EITC is a large part of the answer. Which is stupid. The problem is not so much lack of finances as it is lack of a place in society.
Thank you for that excellent response!
As automation increases exponentially, opportunities for “hewers of wood and drawers of water” will decrease proportionately.
Aside from having already spent the next decade’s receipts, the politicians, and society, will be hard pressed to address the problems that arise when there is no work for a large percentage of the populace.
Equal Opportunity. I like that. Let’s start with closing Sidwell and forcing the children of politicians to go to public school. As a matter of fact, if it isn’t a religious school or a home school, the school should be closed and the kids go to public schools.
Now that our kids are all on the same playing field, let’s see what the outcomes are.
Those with less than average capability do not lack a place in society.
And indeed in the past, there is NO SHAME of being poor, you can still live a dignified life. One has one's own self-respect, and one's own beliefs. Nowadays, 'self-respect' is more of how you view what others think of you.
But those 1% in your post choose to fall out of our current society. Or do I read your post wrong?
What we are seeing is what has always happened throughout history. It just seems weird, because in our little window of time, we’ve never seen it before. But the idea that everyone moves forward, and advances together is just not how Darwin works.
Darwin’s ideal is that a small cohort of the less fit each generation, sees it’s reproduction diminished, as a way of keeping r-selection at bay. As the less fit are removed, this favors fitness, and that will lend advantage to fitness enhancing, K-selected traits, such as monogamy, two-parent rearing, later age at first intercourse, etc.
What has happened is we have prevented this r-selected cohort from being culled, and now they have formed almost a second subspecies within our population. One subspecies is competitive, motivated, driven, and adheres to K-traits like monogamy, two-parent rearing, later age at first intercourse, and loyalty to in-group.
The other subspecies is designed to graze off of government cheese provided by the first, while reproducing using promiscuity and single parenting. As time goes on, and this unproductive group of takers grows relative to the producers, they will eventually crash everything.
A storm is coming.