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1-Page Summary of The Way Back

Overview

The American dream is the idea that anyone can succeed if they work hard and are honest. This desire for social mobility has driven people to keep striving, which has resulted in America’s great wealth and power.

America used to be a land of opportunity, where people could rise from nothing to become rich and successful. But now the system is rigged against the poor, so they can’t get ahead no matter how hard they work. The same goes for those who are born rich; even if they’re not very good at what they do, their wealth protects them from failure. So how can we fix this problem?

In this article, we’ll see how the US could solve its debt crisis and help more people get good jobs by raising test scores to Canadian levels. We’ll also learn that requiring a license for certain jobs would do more harm than good, and that judicial reform could improve social mobility in the US.

Big Idea #1: America’s poor public education system perpetuates social inequality at high economic cost.

Here’s a question: If a boat were traveling from England to the Philippines via the Suez Canal, what would be the names of each body of water it would pass through along the way? Most adults today wouldn’t know that information. However, an eighth-grader in America was expected to know that information back in 1912.

Since then, the standards of American public education have fallen drastically. In fact, according to PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), the United States fell from 25th place in mathematics to 31st between 2009 and 2015. This is important since quality of a nation’s public education directly correlates with social mobility. For instance, Stanford University economist Eric Hanushek found that a child who experiences inequality in their education will grow up to experience inequality professionally.

The US system of education is inferior to other countries, according to Hanushek’s study. It provides an inadequate education for the poor and a great one for the rich. This affects everyone because it leads to inequality in income and quality of life, as well as economic problems that affect everyone.

In 2013, Hanushek followed up with another study that showed how the US could balance its debt crisis by raising standards for public schools to match Canada’s. This would also result in a 20% increase in average worker pay. If this were implemented, it would help the economy by producing more scientists and engineers. It would also allow for every person to have an education that is beneficial to them and the economy as a whole.

Big Idea #2: America’s school admission systems – both wealth- and merit-based – favor the rich.

Higher education in the United States is becoming more and more expensive. For those who can afford it, a good education is available at prestigious colleges. On the other hand, many people are unable to get into these schools because they cannot pay for them. Daniel Golden, Harvard’s alumnus and writer of The Price of Admission, criticizes this practice by pointing out that some students with poor grades were admitted due to their parents’ contributions to the college funds. These individuals include Albert Gore III (Harvard), Harrison Frist (Princeton) and George W Bush & John Kerry (both Yale).

Even if colleges based their acceptance criteria strictly on test scores, such as the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), rich students would still have an unfair advantage over poor students because of the poor public education system.

By comparing the SAT scores of students to their family’s income, you can see that those who could afford a private education did better: