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Who Makes It Into the Middle ClassBy ANNIE LOWREY | New York TimesFri, Sep 21, 2012 6:00 AM EDT

A new studyby researchers at the Brookings Institution shows that about two in three Americansachieves a middle-class lifestyle by middle age - and delves deeply into who makes it there andhow.

Isabel V. Sawhill, Scott Winship and Kerry Searle Grannis tackled the question of why somechildren make it to the middle class and others do not, studying criteria that tend to be indicativeof later economic success and examining how race, gender and family income come into play.

The study breaks life down into stages (for instance, adolescence) and gives benchmarks for eachof those stages (in that case, graduation from high school with a grade-point average above 2.5,no criminal convictions and no involvement in a teenage pregnancy).

They then studied children over time, analyzing whether they met those benchmarks andprojecting whether they would make it to the middle class - defined as the top three quintiles ofincome - by age 40.

Unsurprisingly, the researchers found that success seems to beget success - meeting eachbenchmark makes one more likely to meet the next. Moreover, the effect accumulates. A childwho meets all the criteria from birth to adulthood has an 81 percent chance of being middle class.A child who meets none has only a 24 percent chance.

(Notably, at each stage of life, a person who failed to meet the given criteria had as high as a 59

percent chance of meeting them in the next round.)

The researchers also found that a number of other factors significantly influenced a person'slikelihood of making it to the middle class.

Family wealth, for instance, matters a lot. The researchers show that children born to richfamilies have a 75 percent chance of being middle income or better by the time they reach their40s. For children born to poor families, the chance is just 40 percent.

Children from disadvantaged families are less likely to be ready for school at age 5, less likely tobe competent elementary-school students, less likely to graduate from high school without a

criminal record or a child, and so on.

Race matters as well. About two in five black adolescents met the benchmark of graduating fromhigh school with a decent grade point average, no children and no criminal record by the age of19. About two in three white adolescents did.

The researchers also compared boys' and girls' outcomes. They found that girls are more likely tomeet the given benchmarks through childhood, but they lose ground later in life. Boys become as

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7/28/2019 Who Makes It Into the Middle Class

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likely to meet the benchmarks as girls do by the time they are in their late 20s, and pull ahead bytheir 40s.

Rob 11 hours agoReport Abuse

They need to teach kids about economics, credit, and financial responsibility at an earlyage. Too many people are "poor" because they are terrible with money. Next time youneed to renew your cars plates go to the currency exchange and see all the people whodon't even have bank accounts. Or go to a rent a center and see how many people arewilling to pay $2000 for a $400 lap top just because it's only $30 a week

SCreWYahOO 11 hours agoReport Abuse

I make $31k per year. I am a single white male, no kids, no credit cards(or credit carddebt), No car payment (drive a 94 Toyota 4Runner w/ 310K miles on it). I also pay 22%in taxes. My take home at the end of the year is $24,490. My rent is $975 per month.Utilities normally run about $160 per month and food for me and my per is about $300per month. Roughly about $17,220 which leaves me with about $7,270 for the year, or$605 per month. Now you add gas to the equation and that drops to about $400 permonth. I still manage to save a little. I rarely buy new cloths, or go out to eat. I would stillconsider myself borderline poor. My friends give me a hard time about not going out onthe weekends but if I do I risk collapse on every level. If something was to happen to my18 year old truck I will be SOL. It would be nice to buy a new car but a $300-$500 per

month car payment and insurance would break me. I also do not have health coveragedue to the fact that a halfass plan cost close to $300 per month. Which would also be outof my budget. I am not looking for a handout of any sort, I am comfortable and livewithin my means. What I would like is to pay the same tax rate most billionaires pay.Roughly 15%. That would have me paying $4650 per year v.s. $7270 per year. The extra$218 per month would go directly back into the economy as it would cover a nice portionof a car payment. Not on a Caddy or Mercedes, but a small Honda or Ford. I don't thinkanyone should pay more than 15% of their income no matter what amount you make, andhow you make it. I have no issue with Millionaires or Billionaires, I do have an issuewith our government and the way they screw people out of hard earned money just togive it to a foreign country to buy dictators. I do not know if I am middle class, or poor,nor do I care. I am happy. My point is after the rambling, We need a fair tax code andpeople need to walk away from credit cards. You do not need them. Credit is a myth,designed to enslave you to the big banks. Stop spending everything you make becauseyou expect to make more. Shyte happens people, if you are not prepared everything canfall apart at the blink of an eye.

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