To Understand Inequality, Look to the 9.9 Percent - The New York Times - 0 views
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In his new book, “The 9.9 Percent,” Matthew Stewart focuses on the wealthiest one-tenth of Americans, a “new aristocracy” whose aggregate wealth is four times greater than that of everyone else
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what ultimately unites its members is less the size of their bank accounts than a mind-set, Stewart contends. At its core lies “the merit myth,” a shared belief that the affluent owe their success not to the color of their skin or the advantages they’ve inherited but to their talent and intelligence.
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Under the spell of this conviction, Stewart argues, the privileged engage in practices — segregating themselves in upscale neighborhoods, using their money and influence to get their children into elite colleges — that entrench inequality even as they remain blithely unaware of their role in perpetuating it.
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Some of the people Sherman interviewed compared themselves favorably to another class — the undeserving rich, dilettantes who inherited their money rather than earning it and who ostentatiously displayed their wealth. Distinguishing themselves from these “bad” rich people did not mean Sherman’s subjects were ready to give up their own material advantages. To the contrary, drawing such distinctions affirmed their self-image as “good people” who, by dint of certain character traits (self-sufficiency, restraint), could feel entitled to what they had. In an age of rising inequality, believing they possessed such traits could help assuage “the anxieties of affluence,” Sherman concluded.
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In “The 9.9 Percent,” Stewart notes that in 1963, the median household would have needed 10 times as much wealth to reach the middle of the 9.9 percent. Today, it would need 24 times as much wealth.