I quote from the survey:
I am reminded that it matters quite a bit how questions are asked in a survey like this. The ideal of America is that "all men are created equal", endowed by their creator with rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Clearly, we have not reached that ideal, and clearly the lack of equal opportunity is a problem; people may not feel it is as important a problem as creating more jobs, or they may feel that it is a longer term problem than job creation and thus not as important at this moment. Others problems are also important and urgently in need of solutions such as avoiding a global depression, reducing the deficit, and making Washington politics less dysfunctional.
If the question had been raised as the lack of upward mobility for most young Americans rather than equality of opportunity I would have given a different answer. If 99 percent of our children don't find American a land of opportunity, and the indicators are that they don't, that is a major problem.
Similarly, I don't think the issue of some differences in income -- say between the three middle quintiles -- are a huge problem. What is a huge problem is that the top one percent of the population has too much of the nation's income and wealth, and they have appropriated the lions share of increases in wealth for themselves for decades. If the question had been asked about the salaries and bonuses for Wall Street executives, the statistics might look a lot different.
I am reminded that it matters quite a bit how questions are asked in a survey like this. The ideal of America is that "all men are created equal", endowed by their creator with rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Clearly, we have not reached that ideal, and clearly the lack of equal opportunity is a problem; people may not feel it is as important a problem as creating more jobs, or they may feel that it is a longer term problem than job creation and thus not as important at this moment. Others problems are also important and urgently in need of solutions such as avoiding a global depression, reducing the deficit, and making Washington politics less dysfunctional.
If the question had been raised as the lack of upward mobility for most young Americans rather than equality of opportunity I would have given a different answer. If 99 percent of our children don't find American a land of opportunity, and the indicators are that they don't, that is a major problem.
Similarly, I don't think the issue of some differences in income -- say between the three middle quintiles -- are a huge problem. What is a huge problem is that the top one percent of the population has too much of the nation's income and wealth, and they have appropriated the lions share of increases in wealth for themselves for decades. If the question had been asked about the salaries and bonuses for Wall Street executives, the statistics might look a lot different.
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