In post-Great Recession America, which is the bigger barrier to opportunity—race or class?
A decade ago, the U.S. Supreme Court kept the focus on race as a barrier, upholding the right of colleges to make limited use of racial preferences to ensure a diverse student body. But in a ruling due this month, the court is widely expected to roll back that decision. Such an outcome would shift attention more toward a less constitutionally controversial practice: giving a boost to socioeconomically disadvantaged students, regardless of race.
If that happens, it would reflect more than just a more conservative makeup of the justices. Over the last decade, clogged social mobility and rising economic inequality have shifted the conversation on campuses and in the country as a whole.
As a barrier to opportunity, class is getting more attention, while race is fading.
“The cultural zeitgeist has changed,” said Peter Sacks, author of the book “Tearing Down the Gates: Confronting the Class Divide in American Education.”
“The Great Recession really exacerbated the vast and growing inequalities between rich and poor in America,” he said. “Talking openly about class has been taboo,” he added, but in recent years the evidence of widening inequality has mounted and it’s become “OK for the so-called 99 percent to talk about the 99 percent.”
