A new study shows that social mobility is bad — but that it has been bad for at least the last 50 years. You know what that means for the American Dream. But if you dig a little deeper, you see that where the American Dream has really turned into the American Nightmare is the American South. It’s there where social mobility — the ability to move from the bottom 20 percent of income earners to the top 20 percent — is worse than any developed country for which we have numbers.
In San Jose, there’s a 12.9 percent chance of moving up from bottom 20 percent to top 20 percent. In Charlotte, N.C., it’s 4.4 percent. We know where the problem is. We don’t know why.
Boulder is going to begin tracking energy use in 50 homes for the time when Power utility Xcel has to step aside. “The metering will shape the programs and services offered by a future city-run electric utility.” Daily Camera.
It’s happening every darned week: Another fatal car-versus-bicycle smash in Ft Collins, this time on a frontage road off I-25. It happened Saturday night, when the driver of a silver sedan came up from behind the 46-year-old biker, crashed into him, and then drove off. Coloradoan.
Ross Douthat thinks that liberals are to blame for not fixing our marriage woes. It’s one theory, anyway.
Chutzpah on libido: Huckabee decides to blame the press for quoting him accurately. Via Slate.
Why do some ethnic groups do better than others? There are three things. And they’re not what you think. Via New York Times.
There’s much more to Richard Sherman than being a great and loudmouth football player. Via New York Times.
Lefty Florida Rep. Alan Grayson hates the proposed Trans Pacific Partnership and he’s one of the few people in the nation who has been allowed to read it. On Sunday he held a conference call with MoveOn.org, which put out a release: “Grayson is one of the few members of Congress who have seen the draft text of the TPP. He is not allowed to have staff with him. He is not allowed to take notes. He is prohibited from talking specifically about what he has read… He said this is a giveaway of U.S. sovereignty… that other countries have figured out that trade treaties are a way of getting U.S. taxpayers to spend money to create jobs for foreign workers, that U.S. taxpayers can ‘kiss environmental and worker protection good-bye.'” Grayson reportedly recommended the anti-trade website: www.tradetreachery.com.
[ North Carolina image by KishRieves. ]
