For decades, economists could rely on a comforting graph about happiness over a lifetime: It followed a U-shape, like a smile. Young people were carefree and happy. Middle age was rough but joy returned again in old age. This wasn’t a flimsy finding. More than 600 academic papers, published from 1980 to 2020, documented this […]
Map to the Middle Class
The Map to the Middle Class is a project that will explore what it takes to get to the middle class in an evolving economy
The story of work is one of deepening economic polarization. Good jobs are disappearing for people with only a high-school diploma, while wage and employment gains increasingly accrue to people with higher education. In this series, we’ll explore how trends such as automation could reshape the types of jobs that are available. And we’ll find out how schools can help young people prepare for a landscape where middle-class life is increasingly out of reach.
