I'm upper class. I'm more mobile than him.
British social mobility, so the received wisdom goes, is falling through the floor. A combination of conservatives, seeking to bash the Government, and the Government, seeking to justify further investments in social-mobility boosting public services, have agreed that Britain is now less mobile than it used to be.
One paper has been especially influential, the Sutton Trust’s work from economist’s Jo Blanden, Stephen Machin and Paul Gregg, who used British cohort studies to find a decline in upward mobility between the cohort born in 1958 and that born in 1970. Their 2005 paper has, arguably, had more influence on public debate than any academic paper of the past 20 years. So, mobility is falling? Not so fast, argues Prospect’s own David Goodhart. He finds problems with the findings, their use by politicians, and in particular different methods used by economists and sociologist. The result:
The lazy consensus which has decreed the end of social mobility is both wrong and damaging—implying that despite the billions that Labour, in particular, has poured into pre-school support and so on, nothing will ever change.
As a companion piece to David, we are also luck enough to mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of Michael Young’s The Rise of the Meritocracy with a wry essay from his son, Toby Young, on the rise of the celebritariat – “the people featured in Heat magazine, rather than Hello!, the premier league footballers and their wives, pop stars, movie stars, soap stars and the like.” Toby thinks this celebrity class is surprisingly meritocratic, and because of its visibility, it helps to persuade people that Britain is a fairer place than it really is.
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As long as the West remains militarily more powerful, the ‘centre of gravity’ will never shift towards China/India.Whatever happens on the Wall Street.
But India is already leading Britain in one aspect.
Mr. Toby Young argues:”…Will the day come when the celebritariat endangers its own existence by becoming a self-perpetuating elite, closed off to new members? There are signs that this is beginning to happen, with the children of famous people inheriting their celebrity status, just as aristocrats inherited their parents estates…”
This has already happened in India.
Sons, daughters, wives and concubines of cricketers, film and TV personalities, politicians and businessmen make more than 50% of all “celebrities” in India.
William Leith is right in observing:”…And their (India’s) media is heading for ad-backed celebrity hell faster, and more comprehensively, than ours.”
So, the establishment is agreed that social mobility is not a problem in Britain today. They reasssure us: You just have to look at it the right way. The working class has never had it so good. They can even hope to make it onto reality TV.
I don’t think it’s a matter of money, it’s a matter of efficiency. Are the right people in charge? Michael Young, in my view, needn’t have worried – what we have is not meritocracy, but mediocracy (a term I thought I had invented, but Googling proves me wrong), the rule of the average and the mediocre.
I am afraid the editor gave the game away. In (almost) his owm words: I went to Eton, messed up my A-levels, went to an ordinary university, but, Hey! Here I am! Editor of Prospect!
The anti-intellectual, materialistic English middle class say they send their children to private schools for a better education, but the real reason is to give them a good start in life. The Old School Tie still works; you should be able to find some safe and well-paid billet somewhere, it apparently used to be Lloyds of London for Old Carthusians (see Julian Barnes, Letters from London, Picador 1995, pp192ff).
I have a grudge against Michael Young, because it seems to me that he gave Tony Crosland the ammunition to destroy the grammar school system. I have a theory that post-war British left-wingery was a conspiracy by the ruling class to ensure that, come the revolution, the right people would still be in charge. The extraordinary, widespread ridiculing of the trade unions, which have resisted having their leadership parachuted in but recruit talent from below, may fit in with this. It is odd that the public schools were left alone and now appear to be accomplishing the very thing that Young said he was against, entrenching an hereditary ruling class. His son’s contribtion to this debate is, to my view, plain silly, but never mind, and I am glad that’s he’s doing well for himself!
I apologise for personalising the debate; it’s too important for that. I am not bitter, but resigned. However, I am starting to suspect that the country is becoming less competent; things seem somehow to be more messed up. The Royal Navy’s humiliation by the Iranians in the Gulf not so long ago may be one example. I fear lest we may no longer be training up a good, solid middle cadre of people who can run things properly, the grammar school people who used to provide a lot of the RN’s junior officers in Jane Austen’s time.
Michael Taylor,
27 Duke Street
Oxford OX2 0HX