In my lifetime there has been a marked change in the social mobility of the working class getting access to the middle management jobs that used to be the preserve of the "middle class". In that sense we are far more a meritocracy than ever in the past.
if we are talking about the gap between the super rich and the rest it's not a problem that is think is solved by targeting social mobility. The gap is down to the having access to already created wealth, not through being able to create it because of the school you went to. Access to the sort of wealth that is material is not through a well paid job, but being admitted to a closed shop family fortune. That fortune will likely be tied up in ownership of businesses. Like it or not, you can't re-distribute that wealth as cash payouts without breaking up the business that provides jobs and economic activity
It's existing wealth accumulated over generations and tied up n businesses that sends most children to Eton and Oxford which then gives them access to the top jobs in professions and so a higher income. You can no more blamed for being income rich as you can for being income poor. But the income gap between working individuals is not the issue, the issue is the wealth gap which is all about asset ownership, not salary differential. Going to Eton and Oxford might make you well off, but it does not guarantee you will be super rich. You are already likely to be in the super rich closed shop of your family. Is there any evidence that working class graduates from Oxford doing the same job as those from wealthy families are lower paid - I doubt it.
Only a minority of the super rich get that rich from a salary, most are business owners or children just spending the family fortune.
If you are pulled out of the gutter and sent to Eton and Oxford you might get a well paid job but you do not suddenly get admitted to share in a family business or property empire. Surely the point is whether such an individual should be unhappy seeing the CEO of a corporate giant earning £100m and him only earning £200k a year. Should he be unhappy because a Guardian journalist says it's not fair?
I think the focus should be on the level of low wages employers are able to justify compared to the high wages of senior managers and directors within companies. That is where a realistic re-distribution of wealth is achievable.
Wealth is easily perceived as cash when in fact it is paper value which if tied up in economic activity it can't be just siphoned off and handed out. In some ways it's irrelevant whether wealth is shared between 1m individuals or 100m individuals, it's about ensuring that the assets representing that wealth are used to benefit as many people as possible with economic activity providing well paid jobs.
With you all the way on that one Dippenhall (a rare occurrence), apart from the bit highlighted. I believe that the evidence is that working class/middle class people who go to the same university and get the same or better degrees get less well paid jobs.
The privileged and middle classes are everything that is wrong with this country, whereas the working-classes are honest, broad - minded, hard-working, selfless and not remotely self - pitying or irresponsible for their own actions.
I see your point. There are good and bad in all types. However it's not the working classes who have been in charge of the country since the late seventies...
Both Thatcher and Major came from working- class backgrounds. As for the Tories, you only have to look at the election thread on this forum to see how many of the working-classes voted in a public school toff and his chums for another term...
Are you saying that the working classes have been in charge of the country for the past 36 years then?
I think they are both all to rare examples of a meritocracy working but I do not think either of them was working class.
Unfortunately I believe that the decline of meritocracy in the UK began with MTs policies and not enough enough was done to reverse the decline under Major, Blair and Brown. Things have declined sharply under Cameron and Clegg but (like a lot of things) it plays out over decades so we might not 'notice' how bad it has got for a while.
My statement was factual, I deliberately avoided party political division because it now makes no difference which party has the majority in the commons, and "being in charge" stretches far beyond the confines of that venerable house. The Lords, the landed gentry, the clergy, top businessmen, the press and other media, senior civil servants, local and county councillors and of course bankers and those "in the city" are all among those that are "in charge" in one way or another, and those top jobs are disproportionally more often filled by those that are the product of private education.
Suggesting that Thatcher and Major are some kind of proof that the working classes were running the country is like saying that from '79 to '97 the country was run by women and circus performers.
I couldn't agree more. Like you I am trying to avoid party political division as it can have little bearing on who is actually in charge and I think having a meritocracy is the aim of both left and right (and probably the middle).
What merit would you like? I would prefer it that people with talent and ability in their chosen field got the jobs that reflected their talent rather than people born to influence and power.
I've reached a point at work where I've noticed the level of management above me is almost entirely made up of public school people who have double-barrel surnames. One of which was responsible for losing the company over a million quid, but he's been put in charge of a different project on the same level.
Elsewhere, a young woman has been given something like six different roles in the last three years, having been fast tracked from the most junior role to senior management , despite clearly being a fucking idiot. I gather she was once named in a list of potential wives for Prince William. He dodged a bullet there.
I can't wait to not be working with these people any more.
Comments
With you all the way on that one Dippenhall (a rare occurrence), apart from the bit highlighted. I believe that the evidence is that working class/middle class people who go to the same university and get the same or better degrees get less well paid jobs.
Suggesting that Thatcher and Major are some kind of proof that the working classes were running the country is like saying that from '79 to '97 the country was run by women and circus performers.
What do you suggest?
Elsewhere, a young woman has been given something like six different roles in the last three years, having been fast tracked from the most junior role to senior management , despite clearly being a fucking idiot. I gather she was once named in a list of potential wives for Prince William. He dodged a bullet there.
I can't wait to not be working with these people any more.