Less for many: ‘Opportunity gap’, income disparity, poverty grows in Orange County, By Margot Roosevelt, August 7, 2015, Orange County Register: “Orange County poverty is growing dramatically, along with income inequality, homelessness and overcrowded housing, according to a comprehensive survey by government agencies and charitable organizations. The annual Orange County Community Indicators report, released this week, lays out in 52 pages of stark detail the worsening plight of a growing portion of local families. The result: an ‘opportunity gap,’ seen in ‘abundant supports and resources for the children of higher-income families and stalled or declining social mobility for the children of lower-income and less educated families,’ the report says…”
Tag: Social mobility
Inequality and Social Mobility
Poor kids who do everything right don’t do better than rich kids who do everything wrong, By Matt O’Brien, October 18, 2014, Washington Post: “America is the land of opportunity, just for some more than others. That’s because, in large part, inequality starts in the crib. Rich parents can afford to spend more time and money on their kids, and that gap has only grown the past few decades. Indeed, economists Greg Duncan and Richard Murnane calculate that, between 1972 and 2006, high-income parents increased their spending on ‘enrichment activities’ for their children by 151 percent in inflation-adjusted terms, compared to 57 percent for low-income parents…”
Social (Im)mobility
The American dream gives way to a new reality: social immobility, By David Helling, June 18, 2014, Sacramento Bee: “Allison Gibbons has lived a lifetime of problems. A difficult childhood in a broken home. An eating disorder, drug abuse, depression, alcohol – ‘obviously I was self-medicating,’ she says. She is the mother of a young son whose father is in jail. Today she works for a better life, with dreams of becoming a nurse. ‘I know it’s going to be a struggle, she says. It’s a strain Mary Jo Vernon understands. Thirty years ago she was a single mother with three small children and three jobs . . .”