Even angry critics of inequality partly accept meritocratic belief systems

Evidence

To these men, then, subordination and life position is attributable not so much to the efforts of the individual, something for which he must assume responsibility, as to the circumstances of birth, over which he has no control. Yet for each of those men the channels of advancement were seen as only partly blocked. Rapuano, for example, says elsewhere that income is generally proportionate to ability. … What is surprising is not that it is used at all, but rather that it is used so infrequently. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2161

Categorization

• XREF: Directly supports system justification theory and Motivated Social Cognition — even those who reject the ‘created equal’ myth still hold that income tracks ability.
• QUESTION: Why do people who clearly see birth-determined inequality so rarely translate that into radical politics? This is the puzzle of why class consciousness fails to form.