Yes, the social mobility of Americans is almost non existent. One thing I noticed when I lived there is that even people at the bottom and in the middle thought that it was a meritocracy because 1) smart people who 2) studied really hard get into one of the great colleges, get the good jobs and become powerful and wealthy.

The paper that the article is about shows that your chances of going to a great college are 117 times higher if your parents are top 0.1 percent than if your parents are in the bottom quintile. So little Zach who's dad packs parcels for Amazon doesn't even have 1 percent of the chance of getting into Princeton as Matt who's father heads a team working on the Amazon Web Services. Not even 1 percent.

And apart from that I never understood why a genetic advantage like being born smart is less unfair than other birth rights or whether success in life depending on making the right choices when you are a teenager should be much more of a meritocracy. Almost no kid makes those right choices - to study the right things hard, do extracurricular activities etc - without a supporting parent enabling it.

And when there seem to be no fair meritocracy it's so much worse that the wealth distribution is skewed beyond anything.