WORKING MODELS OF UPWARD MOBILITY:

Some black people consider that it is “selling out” to speak without using slang. Some think it is being fake when you change for other people.

Learning proper grammar and more effective communication is just the beginning of properly selling out.

Most who have successfully achieved upward mobility have multi-year and often multi-generational planning and efforts.

Vietnamese boat refugees came to north america in the 1970s and 1980s.

They often arrived with no money and few possessions and may not have had command of the language.

What was their model of upward mobility ?

They had multiple families in one house. They pooled income in order to buy their first house (with multiple families inside). Multiple families earning to afford the down payment and then to have more incomes to pay the mortgage. There was greater savings of income and capital appreciation in the house. The house would be sold a few years later and the profit split to afford multiple down payments.

So it was not just dual earners. It was say three families pooling and squeezing one family into each room and camping indoors (for years) or being in bunks inside the one room until they earned enough to move. So it would be say 6 earners and more as children got past the age of twelve and were able to earn. Although the children may have been forgiven the need to earn if it meant better success in education.

The Vietnamese boat people had to escape a war torn country (because they were on the losing side) and 10-70% of them died on the oceans to achieve their change of venue (to locations with more opportunity).

All of the children make it through university and get professional jobs, own one at least one home per family.

Is it “selling out?” Or buying in?