Goodbye, Horatio Alger.

This article looks at the degree of income mobility in the United States. The author claims that today in America, one's birth largely determines one's future, even though we're not supposed to be living in a class society. Based on recent data, economists like Bhashkar Mazumder of the Federal Reserve Bank in Chicago argue that 60% of a son's income is determined by the level of income of the father, a 40% rise since earlier in the 1900s.