David Brooks columns I may not finish reading

Holy R > G, Batman! Image via.

Verbatim David Brooks, "In Praise of Equipoise", September 1 2017:

Today, the world feels like a hostile environment to. … well … everyone. I had assumed that as society got more equal we would all share a measure of equal dignity. But it turns out that without an obvious social hierarchy we all get to feel equally powerless.

Maybe if our society hadn't been getting less equal throughout David Brooks's adult life his assumption could have been tested, but it has. This is not a secret. If the existence of a social hierarchy in the US that is more rigid now than at any time since the 1920s, reinforcing itself in a vicious cycle, is not obvious to David Brooks, then he's really in the wrong line of work.

From Isabel V. Sawhill and Edward Rodrigue, "Wealth, Inheritance, and Social Mobility", Brookings Institution, January 2015, arguing for closing loopholes in the taxation of inheritance.