The Underclass As Residue Of Social Mobility

MOST OF us like to write about the underclass as a failure of the welfare state. Underclass unemployment, crime, and social pathology are all the consequence of anesthetizing poor people with subsidies and rewarding failure. But Matthew Parris has a different idea about the underclass, at least in Britain. He sees it as the residue left in the “sink estates” [public housing] after everyone else has left for the suburbs. Says he:

And I wonder too whether, perverse as this may sound, the plight of the poorest in modern Britain is a result of, rather than a reproach to, social mobility.

You see, back in the old days of class, the classes lived separate and looked after their own. The rich found nice little billets for the rich idiots and the deserving poor looked after the “undeserving poor” out of class solidarity.

But with the advent of the meritocratic society everyone is sorted not by origin, class, or caste, but by results. Winners go with winners; winners marry winners. And losers get stuck with the losers.

People with any drive, capable and motivated people, can find their natural level in our less classbound society. They move on, and up[.]

And the losers get left behind.

Tell that to Theodore Dalrymple, author of Life at the Bottom, and see where it gets you.

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Christopher Chantrill blogs at www.roadtothemiddleclass.com. His Road to the Middle Class is forthcoming.