The underprivileged internalize their class position as personal deficiency rather than systemic failure.

Evidence

McNamara, a mild mannered bookkeeper who went to night school to get his training in accounting and bookkeeping, emphasizes education in response to the question: “Do you think it’s easy or hard to get from one class to another?” … Well, I think it’s hard because…not because of the class itself, or what the influence they have on you, but you just seem to reach a certain point, and if you don’t have it, you just don’t—you don’t make the grade. I’ve found that to be true. I always seem to be one step away from a good spot. And it’s no one’s fault—it’s my fault. I just don’t have the education—just don’t—just don’t have what it takes to take that step. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2215

Categorization

• XREF: Direct evidence for system justification and internalized meritocracy that Bourdieu and Jost/Sidanius describe; also resonates with learned helplessness literature. — connects to: Women’s resigned prudence made them obstacles to their own class emancipation. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1744
• FICTION: A bookkeeper who always feels ‘one step away from a good spot’ and blames only himself is a richly tragic character type for contemporary fiction.