What to do about social mobility? The UK has some of the worst rates of social mobility in the OECD, with little progress being made since the 1970s. What can we do to ensure kids from low-income families go on to earn more than their parents?
I will be going back to my old school in Edinburgh to talk to pupils who were in my position 10 years ago; the first in their family to consider university, pursuing a career without any personal contacts in the field to help. With 1 in 5 pupils registered for Free School Meals (as I was), my old school St Augustine’s does admirably well in sending nearly 40% of students to university and college. But what happens then; how do those young people build on their education to get the career they aspire to?
Knowledge is power. To put it bluntly, social mobility is rarely anything but an uphill battle if you don’t know anyone who has stepped out of their parents’ income bracket.
So what can we do for the young people of today who want to fulfil their potential but need a bit more help to get on? Is there anything that we, as individuals rather than policy makers, can do to be part of the solution?
Yes; go back to school! Future First is a charity which aims to create the type of alumni networks in state schools and colleges that private school pupils utilise so well. They are running their first ever ‘Back to School’ week from the 12th to 19th October. The aim is to encourage former students to go back to their old schools and colleges to offer careers advice and guidance. You can find more info on how you can get involved, in whatever way you have time for, here.
You could join a policy working group, write a blog or sign a petition. But if you want to make a tangible difference now, go back to school and give young people in your position however many years ago a helping hand. I’m looking forward to going back to my old school to be part of the campaign for social mobility. It would be great if you could join me.
Editorial note 19.8.13, 5.46pm: this piece was originally mistakenly published in the name of Stephen Williams MP.
* Lara Greer is a parliamentary researcher for Stephen Williams MP
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2 Comments
The problem with social mobility is this country is not primarily down to education. It is the lack of physical labour mobility because NIMBYs in wealthy areas won’t allow houses which poorer people could afford to be built in those areas.
Well…It is great to see good career advice in schools, and I’m sure that all this will certainly help some. I do something similar for undergraduates. But social mobility?
The stark truth is that I might as well not have bothered to go to university when I did. With hindsight I might as well have just take on a mountain of easy debt and lobbed it onto the property ‘market.’ Returns in the economy ever more have accrued to capital (notably housing) and not to labour. A generation of people have had fantastic social mobility out of housing hyperinflation and rent-seeking, but what about the rest? Can we really look to the labour market for marge-scale social mobility at a time of high unemployment (and fearsome underemployment) and declining real wages? Sure, we have social mobility for elite computer scientists, city bankers and the like, but what good is that if social mobility for everyone else is backwards?
I was bought up by my parents to believe that hard work is its own reward – my parents were talking complete gibberish. The reward was the secure house, the car outside, the family life and so on. My Dad left school in 1962 with one O-Level. In 1972 he was able to afford the mortgage on a 3 bed semi (with double-digit interest rates) on a single production line wage. Did he work hard – of course. But social mobility like that was a product of a benign labour market, cheap housing, collective bargaining and nationalised industry as much as his efforts.How long would it now take nowadays for someone with 1 GCSE and no bank of mum and dad to get on the property ladder having left school at 16?
And let’s not duck it – Dad didn’t have to compete with lots of immigrant labour and wage arbitrage either.
I’d love dearly to believe that social mobility will come from good career advice – but deep down we all know that what we are looking at is a massive devaluation of labour. Indeed, looking at internships it would appear that the value of labour has hit zero. When wages are not enough to buy things like housing, how wages be an engine of social mobility? It is telling that Housing Benefits are paid to so many people who are in work.
And all this is before we get to debt-funded education and pensions.
Career advice is great in the way that school choice advisers are great – but advice to 300 people applying for 30 places is at best optimistic. It’s great to do this sort of thing in schools, and anything that closes the gaps is positive. But let’s see it for what it is rather than as pressing real social mobility. You ask what to do about social mobility – it’ll take more than advice.