Amethyst
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
- Joined
- Dec 21, 2008
- Messages
- 12,704
We had SAT prep courses back in 1980-81. I worked in my local public library back then as a high school student and saw many of my classmates attending those Saturday morning classes at the library in preparation for the same SATs I took.
I would say that there are genuine arguments on both sides. I do find that it is more difficult now for people to rise economically, but that you can do much to improve your odds. My father was a first generation college grad, I am well in the 9.9%, but my children have decided not to complete college and work at low paying jobs.
I once read an article (that I cannot find now) that said there are 4 factors that lead to economic success:
Get an education,
Do not fall foul of the law,
Do not have children outside of marriage,
Find and stay married to a good spouse.
If I remember correctly, 98% of those who do this are financially comfortable. Now everyone has an equal shot at doing the 4.
We had SAT and SAT prep back in 1967. Before that they were called College Boards.
IIRC, there was also something you took in Junior year called PSATs ("Pre-SAT") in order to find your weakness/strengths and prepare you for the SATs the following year. Seems that all we did from Sophomore year on was SAT prep. Teach the test sort of thing.
I took the PSATs, too. Didn't have any special prep for them, either. It was that test which told me I'd have no problem with the Math, and no hope with the verbal.
I would hugely disagree with the 4th one. I don't see how that leads to economic success. Staying single can just as much lead to economic success, too.
The PSATs sort of showed up one day in sophomore year, when I was 14. There was no preparation. It was just sort of expected that we would all take them.
I had to get the $6.00 test fee from my parents and get Mom to drive me to school early on Saturday morning to take the test (and pick me up 3 hours later). I recall Dad grumbling about both requirements. Anyway, I scored high enough, in verbal and math (I think scores were 760/630), to be a National Merit semifinalist. So that meant I had to take more SATs later on, to stay in competition. Probably paid the test fee out of my lawn mowing money. Got to Finalist and fizzled out...not enough extracurricular participation, or something.
I would hugely disagree with the 4th one. I don't see how that leads to economic success. Staying single can just as much lead to economic success, too.
I walked to school so my parents were freed of any Saturday responsibility.
I recall back then learning that for the purpose of National Merit competition, they doubled the verbal score before adding it to the math score, giving the verbal score double weight. This annoyed me because my math score was so high and the verbal score was so low.
I fail to see how our hard work, refusing to get into trouble, and LBYM ethics (even when the "means" were barely enough to get by) constitute something "toxic," as the article's opening lines have it.
From the article itself. I encourage you to read the whole thing, it's really a pretty incredible commentary.
In part what we have here is a listening problem. Americans have trouble telling the difference between a social critique and a personal insult. Thus, a writer points to a broad social problem with complex origins, and the reader responds with, “What, you want to punish me for my success?”
Life is inherently unfair. Some of us won the "global lottery" by being born in western countries. Some of us won the "ethnic lottery" by being born into the majority/most powerful ethnicity in their geographical location. Some of won the "family lottery" by growing up with parents or relatives who set a good example - and even then we had to choose to follow that example. Some of us won the "economic" lottery by having or developing skills that others want to pay for at a higher rate.
I would hugely disagree with the 4th one. I don't see how that leads to economic success. Staying single can just as much lead to economic success, too.
The result was from analysis of data around the parameters of peoples' lives. I think the item on marriage comes from the poor outcomes stemming from divorce for many people.
I'm thinking of looking at this from the other end:
By virtue of their sheer volume, the 90% sort of set pricing for almost everything.
Food, cars, dining, clothes, (average) homes, utilities, energy and so on.
Not talking about the truly poor but the average non-10%-er.
So, if the average income for the 90% is let's say $50K, how many of us here would be able to RE without that 'price control'? Could we retire if a night out at Applebees cost $300 and a pair of slacks cost $400?
As often happens, I could be out having some bad brain cramp thinking this way but just wondering.
PLEASE! I'm not trying to be smug about those with less resources. Just wondering about this from a different angle.
For example, is a basic place to live, food, and health care priced for the 90%? Or for what the market can bear?
I listen to "Planet Money" and "Freakonomics" and never can remember where I heard a particular program, but...they did a study of people who won land in a Federal lottery something like 200 years ago. With all the caveats of using records that old, they used census records of families who won/didn't win land at that time and then looked at their descendants- address, occupation, etc. They could see very little difference in prosperity among the descendants of those who had inherited land vs. those who didn't.
I My middle class parents didn't leave me a financial inheritance but they put me on a path of success that was worth a fortune by instilling good attitudes, financing my education, and possibly most important, leaving me free to experiment and risk knowing I had a family I could fall back on if things went wrong. This was a huge psychological advantage that kids who's families are barely getting by don't have.
For those who are mentioning how they don't feel guilty for their success, I don't see why they need to say that. I'm decidedly in the demographic being discussed in this article, as is the author. I don't think anyone is suggesting you feel guilty, and you are not being attacked for the decisions you've made and the advantage you've taken of incentives that have been provided to you.