Social mobility is down to luck. I say this as someone from a single parent in a working class area and now living what would be classed as a typically middle class lifestyle. Although I don’t really feel like I fit on either side now.
There are obviously factors that influence social mobility like two involved parents, early years education, an investment in education (that doesn’t mean private schools but taking children to libraries or museums). Natural genetic ability and access to a good enough school that can nurture that ability. The drive. Along with a whole host of other things. But whether you have access to those things or not, is luck. The lack of systems to support social mobility at the moment just means people need to be luckier.
I have a friend at school who was very similar to me. We had very similar grades, very similar intelligence that we didn’t need to work too hard to get good grades. We both had divorced parents, although her mum had remarried and mine hadn’t. Parents jobs at a similar level. She wanted to do a much more ambitious degree than I did, at a better university. However, her mum was diagnosed with terminal cancer in her first year. She didn’t finish uni. She went back to our hometown. I finished uni and moved away. We both have bought houses but hers was through an inheritance from her mum, she would struggle to save a deposit had that not been the case.
Maybe I had that drive that most people who have achieved social mobility talk about. It’s often labelled as hard work and I have worked hard but not any harder than my friend. As far back as I can remember I knew I had to move away from home, that the type of job I wanted wasn’t available to me there. I think if it had been my mum diagnosed with terminal cancer, I would still have that desire to move away after she’d gone. But maybe if my mum had died I’d have re-evaluated things and ignored that desire to move away, that drive to find a better job. Maybe grief would have drowned that voice saying to move away for a good job out. I can’t say for certain.
I had things stacked against me and things stacked in my favour such as a mum invested in my early education and teachers that took an interest and encouraged me. Maybe it’s that drive to move away that pushed things into my favour but I don’t know where that came from. It’s just always been there in me. Maybe someone (or likely several people) instilled it in me at an early age or maybe I was born with it. As I say, maybe it could have been dampened by bereavement or depression or disability or anything really that makes life harder.
As for increasing chances for your own kids social mobility, put as many things in their favour as you can - be invested in their education, take them to the library and the museum. Try to encourage them to move away if they need to and understand that means they won’t visit all the time, you might go long periods without seeing them. If you have good financial literacy, teach it to them. If not, try and find someone who can teach them how to manage their money. Then hope they’re one of the lucky ones.