The Great Gatsby Curve Essay

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Why is it so hard for the poor to get ahead? Is the American dream dead, or is it just some utopic fantasy that’s non-reachable? Kids with high-income parents who don’t graduate from college are more likely to end up rich somewhere compared to low-income students who do graduate from college. In the article “The great Gatsby curve’: Why It’s So Hard for the Poor to Get Ahead” the author O’Brien talks about how Americans have more inequality and less mobility than any other counties, which is known as “The great Gatsby curve”. In some cases it’s harder to climb the social ladder when rugs are far apart. His main focus was low-income students who have a very small amount of opportunity and don’t get the chance to shine, especially in their early years of life before college. Low-income students opt out of selective schools and instead aim for community colleges or small state schools. Top ivy schools are our conduit to the top. Parents often aren’t as involved or even around and we are not helping the ones who do succeed to succeed more. The first step in any plan to reverse inequality is more redistribution, but…show more content…
Social class affects the access to education because low-income families cannot afford to put their children in private schools or have money to pay for tutors or afterschool activities. Since there are no high tax paying rates in poor areas this means there is less money for schools. Here is how education reproduces inequality; through economic advantages, which is the school funding system, social capital, social network impacts, cultural capital and being able to show cultural knowledge through the right culture, worldview and aspirations, which is what you want to be and what is possible for you. The lower class don’t have the opportunity to see what is out there for them because they are worried about surviving the
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