Your future wealth is decided by the time you’re 3

[minimathsmouse]

"Social mobility in Britain is the worst in the Western world and the gap between rich and poor has become ingrained in children as young as three"

As we know, so far the response has been to make savage cuts and close family centres, to come up with policy after policy that will just polarize the haves and have nots.

Sorry it's the mail www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2137585/Britain-worst-social-mobility-Western-world.html

'These anecdotes are typical'

How typical? What percentage of parents don't cuddle their children or talk to babies of 3 or 6 months?

Is it due to these parents that social mobility in Britain is the worst in the Western world? Do we have more parents like this than any other country in the Western world?

The study seems to emphasise intervention for families of under-fives. But what about the poor literacy levels in our schools at age 11? Will the neuroscientists suggest some improvements in schools at that age?

I do not mean to offend with what i am about to say i just mean to be honest, that doesn't mean i'm right it's just my opinion, but some children are never going to be brain surgeons. Grammar Schools were aimed at the academics of our society and Secondary toward craftsmen and more manual careers. Now i am not advocating bringing these schools back but why is there so much emphasis on academia, is the man who craft's the judges bench less important than the judge. Apprenticeships told our non academic youth they were valued that if they were not gifted enough to be brain surgeons there was no shame in being the person who made the scalpels. A lot of our youth have no hope they need physical work, manufacturing, building, steel working oops i forgot they've nearly all gone.

Yes, a lot of these jobs no longer exist. So young people are encouraged to take out huge loans to pay for degrees in media studies and often find that there are no jobs in that either.

I think they are very typical, what this study and others say. Big studies into language and parenting, shocking percentages (that I can't remember and don't have to hand) where parents don't think you need to talk to babies, think language acquisition can happen through exposure tv, know no nursery rhymes etc.

Didn't mean to imply that these parents don't do these things at all, that gives real brain atrophy...think scans of Romanian toddlers. Tiny shrunken brain especially in regions that deal with emotion. Lots of parents don't do these things enough, aren't consistent, aren't skilled at parenting.

This study says what others have, what primary heads bang on about at conferences. What those dealing with adoption know well, bugger up the first few years and the rest are proportionally disadvantaged.

Most children will find high schools don't address literacy, they focus on making the curriculum accessible. There are schools that have withdrawn the illiterate from the curriculum and focused on reading recovery but few do this. Ther are horrific cost implications when these chidren usually attract no extra funding.

Are we the worst? No idea, we invest less in 0-3s than scandanavian countries, have more americanisation than lots of Europe. We have some places socially more than economically deprived, we have too much wealth inequality...all contributes.

I think the issue of parental school choice could be an issue here too. In my town the "outstanding" schools are in the more affluent parts of town that most young families are unable to buy in. Therefore we have swathes of people driving their children 2 miles across town to these "outstanding" schools. Meanwhile the regular schools are (mostly) full of either parents who are not so bothered about Ofsted reports/ not very interested in their childs education/ cannot / do not want to drive.
So there has developed a real social divide in the town.
If people just sent their child to the nearest school, not only environmentally would it be better, but would also mean schools were more socially mixed.
I am pretty sure this type of thing is happening nationally and whilst I can see the argument that the housing in the catchment areas of outstanding schools would go up in the short term - in the longer term, schools would become more mixed and other schools would improve so the desirability of what were outstanding schools would reduce.

Actually the original newspaper story did say that there were differences in parenting, on average,between families on different incomes
e.g. Lower incomes households did less reading and less constant bedtimes.

how does the state fix this in a free country? Perhaps bedtimes are less fixed in workless households.

nb: its mot reverse snobbery to check where someone lives and filter out those whose story does not add up. I want to employ people with determination. If aged 30 you are applying for a job paying less than your school fees, you are a looser, imo! Someone who comes from shitsville who has covered a lot of ground in their live is much more employable.

And someone with a big house, who clearly does not need the job to pay for it because, does not need the job! So how reliable will they be? Chances are less than someone who needs it to pay the mortgage...

I am shocked, I can't believe someone was turned down for a job interview because they didn't own their own house or should have covered more ground before they were 30!!! Even some of the most infamous wealthy people in this country, Richard Branson, I believe, lost it all at one point before going on to make his millions. Oh well, I believe in karma.

I was born 1 of 8 on a shit-hole council estate in Liverpool. I looked up my old address on google and it's still a shit-hole now 40 years later. My mum stayed at home, with the occasional bit of cleaning or dinner ladying. My dad was in and out of work most of my life, in various jobs: taxi driver, cleaner, caretaker, gardener, bus driver, building site labourer type of thing. Until he found secure work as postie down south.

What made a difference to their children's social mobility? The now extinct assisted place scheme. They didn't have a pot to piss in, but their kids all got to go to top ranking public schools. (I is well clever:o)

Good post, Kladdkaka.
The assisted places scheme was brought in by Thatcher and abolished by Blair.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted_Places_Scheme

Thatcher probably didn't believe the "experts" that 'the gap between rich and poor has become ingrained in children as young as three'. She probably believed in education making a difference, which is why she funded places for poor children at independent schools.

I don't think Thatcher had much time for all these experts and 'tsars', she just fixed the fundamentals and concentrated on the tried and tested 3Rs

'Your future wealth is decided by the time you?re 3'

Thank God we have eminent people like Sir John Major KC, CH, PC, ACIB to act as a role model and show children that that is not true in this country.

He never went to schools like Eton or Fettes
'Major left school at age 16 in 1959, with three O-levels: History, English Language, and English Literature'
but did he make it, you bet!

Apologies in advance if what I'm about to say offends anyone but if the link between having feckless parents and their offspring having low social mobility is so clear cut, isn't the answer to disincentivise the feckless from breeding in the first place?

As for how you might achieve that, I throw open to the floor...

But that is why these studies should be taken with a pinch of salt. There is no absolute link between feckless parents and low social mobility. There are children who have had drunks as parents, but who have still risen high. The key factor is the quality of the education they receive in our schools, not the IQ or fecklessness of their parents.

Then how can they be written off at three?

Who believes that they are really written off at 3, except for the nanny staters?

shershtiWed 02-May-12 08:34:58 I am shocked, I can't believe someone was turned down for a job interview because they didn't own their own house or should have covered more ground before they were 30!!!

if your parents sent you to a public school costing app £30kpa, by the time you are 30, you should have achieved more than appyling for a job for £27k. you have had lots of advantage in life and still around the average salary.

the job has gone to someone who had a less given to them on a plate & achieved more.

i measure someone how they have handled the opportunties they have been given and obstacles they have faced.

Who really believes the 'scientific' determinism that future criminals can be spotted at the age of two? Who believes this type of typecasting, which probably is only believed of the poor and not the rich?

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/9129539/Future-criminals-can-be-spotted-at-age-of-two.html

Exactly right, Wasabi. That is the real world. People are measured on their achievements, because it is an indicator of their dynamism, ambition and get up and go. That's why interviewees are often asked "what is your greatest achievement?" etc.

Weren't these inequalities being addressed by the Sure Start programme. It had a lot of success....oh wait, it was cut.

The age at which they can spot future criminals seems to be going down all the time.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-110461/Identify-future-criminals-age--Blunkett.html

Soon they may tell us it is at birth or even before due to feckless parents.

This study says what others have, what primary heads bang on about at conferences. What those dealing with adoption know well, bugger up the first few years and the rest are proportionally disadvantaged

Teachers will tell you that children are starting school in nappies, that children have few social skills, they are not ready to start reading and some of these children have very stunted speech and vocabulary.

I agree with everything splashingaround has said.

Should the state step in? teach parents how to parent, does it have the right to intervene in family life? what level of social and emotional deprivation within a family is the cut off point when the state should decide involvement is necessary?

As regards Thatcher and the 3Rs, I will swear in a minute bollocks.
The women ripped the heart out of working class communities and we are now reaping the rewards of this, as are successive generations of kids. Factories closed, unemployment was welcomed and actively sought by Maggie because it depressed wages and labour power.

Get on ya bike to where the work is and the mentality that says social mobility rests on moving away from depressed communities has left a huge void. No leadership, no work, no hope and no role models. No extended family networks and social cohesion. All of these factors plus the fact that the working class has been demonized and disempowered.

WasabiTillyMinto - You measure people against whether they have been lucky or not then it seems to me. I know people who have had a private education and others whose background is the polar opposite and I think it is unfair to make judgements in this way. Do these people have the opportunity to speak up in order to explain why they find themselves in the positions which are apparantly so detrimental to future employers that whether they are qualified to do the job or not they are unsuccessful in even qualifying for an interview? I'm not sure I would like to work for a company that is seemingly so blatantly discriminatory.
With regards to measuring someone against how they have overcome obstacles they have faced, how would you rate my husband who, after setting up his own construction business almost 18 years ago has now, despite working every hour god sends trying to keep his staff in paid work and trying to drum up more work has now had to call it a day as due to the current climate the work just isn't there and hasn't been for some time?

Shershti - i dont think i have explained myself clearly - i dont care if someone is privately educated or not. but if you have had great opportunity, you should have acheived more than this candidate had on his CV in 10 years. i dont care if someone has had a blip e.g. a redundancy (or even 2 in this climate) but 10 years of underachieving says alot about someone.

i have recently hired someone who had a business that didnt work. if you run your own business you know how difficult it is on the front line. the fact they tried says something very positive about them.

I don't know how true this is but a parent I know got some private tuition from a tutor who used to work at a local private school.
She said that at primary level, the only difference between state and private is the repetion and re-enforcement of whats already been taught through parental involvement ie homework I guess.
I know one parent of a primary private school child getting annoyed about how much work the parent had to do with the child.

I do think parenting has a lot to do with it. If education is encouraged at home than surely those children will do well in almost any school? (unless it really is a v bad school). They still stream in most schools dont they?