Imagine that it’s 2020, Boris Johnson is gone, and you are the new British prime minister Jeremy Corbyn — or perhaps his more electable Labour successor. You are leading a coalition. Your mission is to make the UK fairer. British social mobility is “stagnant”, and a person’s background strongly predicts their future career, says the government’s Social Mobility Commission. The country’s elite passes down advantage from generation to generation: 64 per cent of Johnson’s cabinet went to private schools. All this unfairness helped prompt the vote for Brexit.
想象一下，现在是2020年，鲍里斯•约翰逊(Boris Johnson)已经离开了，而你是新任英国首相杰里米•科尔宾(Jeremy Corbyn)——或者是工党中其他更可能当选的首相继任者。你在领导一个执政联盟。你的使命是让英国变得更公平。英国政府的社会流动委员会(Social Mobility Commission)表示，英国社会流动性“停滞不前”，一个人的出身极大地预示出他未来的职业生涯。英国的精英阶层将优势代代相传：约翰逊的内阁中有64%的人上过私立学校。所有这些不公平帮助推动了英国退欧投票。