In this New York Times article, Nicholas Kristof expresses his fear of the world becoming an increasingly "socially rigid society our forebears [once] fled." He supports this fear by quoting examples of class gaps and summarizing his best friend, Rick Goff, life struggles. After concluding the article, there were three quotes that stood out as interesting to me:
1. Kristof quotes Senator Marco Rubio in the beginning of the article, stating that America has "never been a nation of haves and have-nots" but rather "a nation of haves and soon-to-haves, of people who have made it and of people who will make it." Ever since America was created our nation has pressured its self to be at the top. This quote states that America offers multiple opportunities to obtain the top rank and promote change, such as the race into space to land a man on the moon and return him safely back to earth during Kennedy's presidency or Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech and efforts to one day have black children and white children play together. Kristof stresses within this quote that not all people are "privileged" enough to have access to achieve these opportunities.
2. Kristof includes a quote from Alan Krueger, a Princeton economist, who concludes that "the chance of a person who was born to a family in the bottom 10 percent of the income distribution rising to the top 10 percent as an adult is about the same as the chance that a dad who is 5 feet 6 inches tall having a son who grows up to be over 6 feet 1 inch tall; It happens, but not often." Even though an American individual possesses the capability to be creative, intelligent, and prosperous in his/her lifetime, it is very rare for an individual to carry out a successful life. The individuals success is instead dependent upon their ethnicity, parents financial income, and access to quality education and living materials.
3. Towards the middle of Kristof's article, he includes statistical information stating that "77 percent of adults in the top 25 percent of incomes earn a B.A. by age 24. Only 9 percent of those in the bottom 25 percent do so." Kristof also quotes Tim Wise's comment about American's opinions on this statistical information by saying that Americans display an "increasingly vituperative narrative of cruelty to those at the bottom." Americans with Bachelor's degrees at the top of financial status are quick to judge lower class people with only an Associates degree or no degree at all as being lazy. What about the cost of college across America these day? The cost to maintain a stable living environment for a family? The time and stressful schedules to manage with multiple paying jobs to support oneself, family, and education? Before people are quick to judge the lower classes of people as "lazy" maybe they should take into consideration these factors first.
-Questions/Comments/Points to Share:
America is recognized as the "land of the free" or "the home of the brave" or, according to Kristof, "the land of opportunity." For some people these titles are true, as for others its viewed as a lie. During my lifetime I never had to worry about not having someone at my house to take care of me, wonder if I would have food for dinner, have a short supply of clothing or shoes to wear, question whether or not I would be given a quality education, or even wonder If I would be able to afford college. I am apart of the 77% of adults in the top 25% of incomes who will go onto graduate with a Bachelors degree, not because I worked hard to achieve good grades but ultimately because I am white and have the necessities (food, clothing, shelter, technology, learning materials, financial stability, etc.) needed to. Meanwhile if you are other nationality other than Caucasian, not able to afford quality education, have trouble providing for yourself and family because you could not land a job due to not having access to quality education, live in areas of high poverty and crime, and more then you are viewed as the poor class of America who is considered "lazy" and sometimes dangerous to the "privileged" upper class, who wants no obligation in helping you since they think they have worked hard to get to where they are today...... but did they really?
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