The Gap No One Wants to Talk About
The achievement gap is misleading because it keeps the focus on all the wrong things. That gap is simply a metric for a root cause gap—the inequity gap.
But even more troubling is that addressing the achievement gap or simply allowing the term itself to be a default fact is ultimately a tremendous distraction that serves the privileged.
The gap no one wants to talk about is the ever-widening wealth gap in the U.S. [1]
Consider a typical (and, again, distracting) claim: But the top 20% income earners pay 64% of taxes!
Ever wonder why? Because, in 2009, the top 20% made 59% of the income:
|
Table 7: Distribution of income in the United States, 1982-2009 |
|||
|
|
Income |
||
|
Top 1 percent |
Next 19 percent |
Bottom 80 percent |
|
|
1982 |
12.8% |
39.1% |
48.1% |
|
1988 |
16.6% |
38.9% |
44.5% |
|
1991 |
15.7% |
40.7% |
43.7% |
|
1994 |
14.4% |
40.8% |
44.9% |
|
1997 |
16.6% |
39.6% |
43.8% |
|
2000 |
20.0% |
38.7% |
41.4% |
|
2003 |
17.0% |
40.8% |
42.2% |
|
2006 |
21.3% |
40.1% |
38.6% |
|
2009 |
17.2% |
41.9% |
40.9% |
As Paul Buchheit explains in “Five Ugly Extremes of Inequality in America– The Contrasts Will Drop Your Chin to the Floor,” the inequity gap in the U.S. is staggering:
1. $2.13 per hour vs. $3,000,000.00 per hour…
2. A single top income could buy housing for every homeless person in the U.S….
3. The poorest 47% of Americans have no wealth…
4. The U.S. is nearly the most wealth-unequal country in the entire world…
5. A can of soup for a black or Hispanic woman, a mansion and yacht for the businessman…
The current education debate is ultimately just a subset of the larger inequity of wealth debate in the U.S. While entering the education debate may make many educators uncomfortable (it shouldn’t and educators must enter the debate), educators must also speak against and to the social and political discourse that seeks to keep the wealth gap off the table.
[1] See “Picturing Inequality” at Truthout
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