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Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

economist.com

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Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#201

Post by jandrewrogers »

inetknght wrote: post #126
csallen wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12% of Americans struggle from food insecurity. By definition, 20% of Americans are in the top quintile. I'm with you, I want that first number to be as close to 0% as possible. But it's mathematically untrue that there are dozens of Americans starving for every American in the top 20%. In fact, there are barely half as many.

I count myself to be lucky in the top 20% of earners in America and have friends who also fit in the range. I've met a lot of people who struggle to put food on the table whose income is in the middle 50%. A lot of them have the same complaint: they don't qualify for help because they make too much . But they also struggle to pay their bills because they don't make enough. I don't know where you think 12% of American…

It may be that the definition of "food insecurity" is broader than your intuition.

Per Federal Reserve studies, ~10-15% of US households have no discretionary income after all essential expenses, which includes food. For people in this financial state, any unplanned expense will cut into their already limited budget for food. Even though they have food, and won't starve, this risk is likely sufficient to be deemed "food insecure". However, in practice this is often offset by the myriad USDA and other food subsidy programs.

We received a lot of free food from the US government when I was a child, and I doubt the programs are less generous today. I definitely would have met the definition of "food insecure" at the time even though we always had food.

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#202

Post by eikenberry »

JaimeThompson wrote: post #161
TuringNYC wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I could make $10B. I still wouldn’t reach the top level of class. Maybe my kids kids will. Is there really anyone wrong with this? If you and your family are happy, and your needs are met, and clearly you have options -- does anyone else's definition of class really matter?

When our elected leaders and law enforces listen to the upper class(s) instead of everyone equally then yes, it matters.

So you're saying that the defining aspect of being upper class is how much you bribe politicians?

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#203

Post by siruncledrew »

thepasswordis wrote: post #119

Regardless of how much money I make, none of my friends went to Stanford, I grew up in a boring town in a boring part of the world, and I made my money in an “unglamorous” industry. I could make $10B. I still wouldn’t reach the top level of class. Maybe my kids kids will. Here’s an attempt to say something positive about this: you guys should try to seek out those unglamorous industries, usually in unglamorous parts…

What are the "unglamorous" things that print money?

Are you talking about like oil/natural gas? Or what else

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#204

Post by jmeister »

rpmisms wrote: post #122
lifeformed wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not hugely difficult to earn six figures in the US if you're committed, work hard, and pick a good field. That's if you also had a healthy learning environment at school and home, can afford college, and have a healthy early development to be able to grow up into an sufficiently smart child. A lot of people in the bottom 20% don't have those initial conditions.

Unschooled, no college, committed parents. All I needed.

The last part is priceless.

From a great article I read recently:

“A solid, two-parent home is critical for a child’s future. There is simply no shortcut."

“ Poverty, even extreme poverty, is surmountable. What is nearly impossible to overcome is the instability—the psychological havoc—created by broken homes. Especially for boys.”

https://twitter.com/robkhenderson/status/1456287662243991560

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#205

Post by yibg »

ipeefreely wrote: post #3

Social mobility is really hard to measure, but all else equal, I think America is the best place in the world for a poor person to become filthy rich (top 0.1%) but not the best place in the world for a poor person to simply transition to middle/upper class.

Maybe also depends on the background of the poor person. I grew up poor. Definitely in the bottom 20% of income or wealth. However my parents were both very educated (immigrants), valued education, and I had a stable family life. I did well in school, went to university and am now moderately successful financially.

But I can see someone with a similar financial background, but growing up in a family that didn't value education, perhaps single parent working all the time struggling much more to get ahead.

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#206

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

csallen wrote: post #155
tshaddox wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The more people who belong to the so-wealthy-it's-hard-to-achieve group, the better. Aren’t you just literally saying that social mobility is bad?

No, I'm saying that there's always going to be some level of wealth that's difficult to achieve. We can all pull a number out of thin air that's just super high, that's tough to imagine people in the bottom 20% commonly getting to in their lifetime. For argument's sake, let's say that number is a net worth of $500K. (Because that just so happens to be the minimum net worth to be in the top 20% of Americans[0].) What…

You're totally conflating relative and absolute wealth.

Society is probably better off when the median absolute wealth increases, which will be achieved by more people achieving higher wealth levels.

But as is becoming increasing clear (again), society is worse off when relative wealth distinctions grow (at least, if they grow too large).

If more people make it to $500k, the 5th quintile threshold will move up. That means that the gap between the bottom quintile and the top quintile will increase. We could choose to be happy that more people have made it to $500k, or we could choose to be upset that the gap between the lower 4 quintiles and the upper one has grown.

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#207

Post by tlear »

csallen wrote: post #100
forgotmyoldname wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean... that doesn't detract from the problem at all. That just says there's a massive wealth divide and that moving up to the mere top 20% (the group 1 out of 5 people belong to) should be considered a ridiculous proposition unless you're born into it. Why should 1 out of 5 people belong to a group so wealthy that saying mobility is difficult should be considered problematic?

> Why should 1 out of 5 people belong to a group so wealthy that saying mobility is difficult should be considered problematic? Why is it a bad thing that so many people are so wealthy? The more people who belong to the so-wealthy-it's-hard-to-achieve group, the better.

It is the normal propaganda of the class war. Identify Kulak, murder kulak.. profit (or mass famine).

Usually they start with top 1% or a bit more, these guys jumped straight to 20%. But I am sure if you vote properly and donate to “causes” you Kulakness can be overlooked for now, proper public self flagellating is also necessary.

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#208

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

pentae wrote: post #97
refurb wrote: post #58

Again, it's highly problematic defining mobility as "moving from bottom quintile to top quintile". - Moving from bottom quintile to 2nd highest is significant mobility and completely ignored in this analysis. - The analysis ignores the fact that the highest quintile in the US is higher in absolute terms than other countries. So moving from bottom to 4th may give more income than bottom to 5th in other countries. - Th…

The economist has been pushing a certain political agenda for a while now, I cancelled my subscription a while ago because of this reason

You didn't consider that this quite old publication, renowned for its conservative market-friendly op-eds and neutral-as-can-be reporting, may have realized that wealth inequality and lack of social mobility is a bit more important than they used to think?

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#209

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

ummonk wrote: post #149
kbenson wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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,…

Even 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.

How can "merited economic brackets" span generations?

Re: Americans overestimate social mobility in their country

#210

Post by ZephyrBlu »

rpmisms wrote: post #130
stale2002 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> “What I’ve seen contradicts measured statistics across the country” is not a convincing argument. You are not understanding the other possibilities here. The other possibility is that yes, it is true that it is not that hard to make it to this level of success, but the stats are still true, and it is simply that people don't do this, for other reasons. There are a multitude of reasons, as for why someone might not…

A lot of people simply don't want to be HTPL maintenance, for example. It pays very well, but it's hard . That's not acceptable to a lot of folks right now. My sister-in-law's fiancé is doing it as a journeyman, and he's making very close to what I do as a mid-level SWE.

> My sister-in-law's fiancé is doing it as a journeyman, and he's making very close to what I do as a mid-level SWE

This is not a very useful statement without a ballpark figure. Mid level SWE salaries range from 300k depending on the company.

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