>> the likelihood of a child raised by parents born into the lowest income quintile moving to the top quintile by the age 40 was a disastrous 3 percent. <<
Hey, I am a 3 percenter!!!
Maybe it had something to do with my Mom emphasizing that reading was important (I grew up on Asimov, Heinlein, MacDonald, Farmer and, yes that slut Bradbury).
She also made it clear poverty was temporary and education was permanent. It is a long and sad story about how we ended up in poverty but my siblings and I all came away with the same VALUES: education and knowledge for their own sake, intellectual curiosity (why are somethings so and others not so?).
The greatest gift you can provide is these values. I thank God I was able to tell Mom how they shaped me before she died (too young).
Thanks for my new tag :)
I’ve been saying this to everyone I know since I read Coming Apart. The data is shockingly clear. If you want to succeed in life, do this:
1) Get Educated
2) Stay off drugs,
3) Get married.
Well, due to liberalism and political correctness and their lines of thinking, we can’t really have these discussions about the importance of marriage, how children are raised, etc. You are behind the times, thinking we live in a Leave it to Beaver world, etc. etc.
As Dan Quayle found out years ago, touching on this subject will provoke attacks that you are criticizing single mothers, that you hate single mothers, etc.
We can’t seem to discuss issues based on the merits. Instead, liberals turn it into a situation in which you are hateful or critical of whoever is involved.
Examples: opposing homosexual marriage means you hate a homosexual.
Opposing abortion on demand means you hate women, and are a part of the war on women.
Opposing the global warming industry means you hate mother earth, and want a polluted environment.
Opposing affirmative actions means you hate minorities and are racist.
We have all heard variations of these types of statements from the left. We can’t discuss issues for what they are. Instead we are steered into debates about why do you have (fill in the blank)???
Marriage implies mutual dedication, moral committment, and longevity to a male/female relationship ;
implied is ,in the event of children, there is continuity of role-modeling by two parents who offer support and supervision .
I believe that two parent support and supervision is reflected by academic concern, and involement, which leads more likely to academic success.
Why is it that in some inner city school systems, the graduation rate through high school is as low as 13% ?
Those same school systems continue to operate, expressing dismay over the low graduation rate, but fail to substantly take any significant corrective action .
I attribute “the marriage privilege” as leading to academic success , role modeling ,and ultimately to financial success and personal satisfaction .
They ARE talking about it. Their answer is gay marriage, to further destroy the so-called priviledge of married couples with children
Occassionally a social scientist will get it right.
Only occassionally, though.
Moved ‘em off the cotton plantation and on to the welfare plantation. Slavery of a different kind.
I certainly understand why the writers would choose to make the points that they do, by employing an inane, nonsensical framing of the dynamics of the family, as an answer to the gobbling of the Academic Left, in its endless effort to stir up hatred & envy in America. However, to the extent that it gives the appearance of acceptability to the Leftist gambit on misusing the term "privilege," it is a mistake.
While just about everyone at Free Republic understands that the garbage being spewed about "White Privilege," is in fact garbage; others, less well informed about the line between reality & fantasy, may be inclined to take the "concerns" being parroted, more seriously. To the extent that the National Review frame, here, gives credibility to the Leftist diaglog, it is a mistake.
William Flax
btt