The Myth of Economic Immobility
29th April 2014
The fact that America is as economically mobile now as it was in the days when the top marginal federal income tax rate was 70 percent doesn’t mean that the country is as economically mobile as it can or should be. Nor does the extremely stable nature of U.S. economic mobility negate the fact that individuals on the high end of the income spectrum are getting richer faster than anyone else.
But Obama’s widely shared misconception also misses the greater cultural context. Economic mobility is not the sole measure of national well-being or progress. It’s not even the sole measure of mobility.