Monday 27 July 2009

The middle class, the meritocracy and more from Young

Anyone else see the irony in Radio 4's Broadcasting House inviting Toby Young to be part of a debate on social mobility and meritocracy on Sunday because he is Michael Young's son? Oh yes.

Also Young was back at the Radio 4 studios this morning talking about why US-style summer camps have never caught on in the UK, his pithy analysis was because the UK middle classes sent their kids to boarding school, they couldn't send them away in the summer as well.

I have news for you Toby, only 7% of the population send their kids to private schools, and let's say half of those are at boarding schools that is a mere 3.5% of the population - this is not a massive middle class trend. This is "middle class" used in the way that the Daily Mail likes to use it to refer to people who earn over £150,000, and try and pretend this is the national middle income.

Toby, that might be you, but you are not in the middle.

1 comment:

Daniel E said...

This is what the progressive blogosphere should be best at - short pithy fact-based responses to right wing punditry crap. Matt Yglesias, eat your heart out