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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka
From: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: AA/Quota's, etc, why I don't like them...
Message-ID: <489@mmintl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 15-Jul-85 15:14:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: mmintl.489
Posted: Mon Jul 15 15:14:50 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 20-Jul-85 04:27:40 EDT
References: <3890@alice.UUCP> <234@ubvax.UUCP> <726@ihlpg.UUCP> <243@ubvax.UUCP>
Reply-To: franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams)
Organization: Multimate International, E. Hartford, CT
Lines: 24
Summary: Parental circumstances or attitudes


In article <243@ubvax.UUCP> tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch) writes:

>I think what I said was that improving education (i.e. giving everyone
>a better education) would not change who gets the good careers and
>who gets the bad ones.  This is because better parental background
>reflects itself as more educational success which translates into
>better careers.

I find it interesting that no one has seen fit to examine what seems to
me to be the fundamental underlying problem with this argument.  That is
the assumption that the parents' JOB is the relevant factor.  It seems
to me that the parents' attitudes and culture are the more relevant
variable.  Those brought up in families where the parents read books,
hold intelligent conversations, and regard school work as important can
be expected to do better than those that don't.  And those families are
(I don't, of course, have any statistics; how do you measure this?)
by and large precisely those where the parents have good jobs -- because
they have these attitudes.

What is not clear is that giving a person a good job will change these
attitudes.  Maybe it will, at least in some cases.  But it does not look
to me like a direct attack on the cycle of poverty.  The only way to break
the cycle of poverty is to change attitudes.