If you live in the United States of America chances are high that you will live in the same economic status that you and your parents are born into. The American dream of rising out of poverty or even moving up in the ones socioeconomic status is highly unlikely. In the United States, less than 50% of children born in the 80’s will out earn their parents.. I find this statistic interesting and a complete bummer. Why has social mobility gone down every year since the 1940’s?
That is a big question with lots of moving parts. society is a group of people living together in an ordered community and there are lots of parts in that society that can and do influence socioeconomic mobility in that society. Guess what is currently the number one driving force behind socio economic mobility in a society?
Did you guess? What was your answer? Was it crime or lack of? Was it education? Was it natural resources or access to them? Well the answer is (insert drum roll here)…. COMMUTE TIME TO WORK!! Yeah my mind is also blown something that simple seems to make all the difference. Long commute times work to keep society in poverty. Lack of mobility creates a lack of socio economic mobility.
So what can we do? I quit a job with an hour and a halve commute two years ago and traded for a 10 minute commute and have never been happier. I understand that not everyone has that luxury though. Stronger, good communities provide robust public transportation. Good communities are made up of citizens who participate in them. I know you are tired form the long commute but if you can get active and attend local town hall and county meetings, this is where the public transportation is often shelved in the United States of America and this is where you, the good citizen, needs to be heard. “Hey guys who are already in the upper class, if we shelf this transportation plan, no one will reach the status you are at now.”
Cities cannot afford to not have good, clean and safe transportation. It is possible and will happen eventually don’t you want to be able to say that you drove this change?
The Corrigan Encore 