From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is the deal.

Today. For decades, Americans have believed that the best way to end racial inequality is to end class inequality.

How a landmark 30-year study is debunking that logic.

It's Friday, March 23rd.

One of the most important principles I think of America is that no matter who you are, no matter what you look like, if you work hard, you can get ahead.

Anyone who wants to work can work his way out of poverty.

It's the only way to get out of poverty is to have a job, to show up, to work really hard, and to be positive within the environment in which you're working.

That's why you look people out of poverty.

You can make it. America will provide opportunity.

I think we have these fundamental ideas about fairness in the economy in the United States.

Emily Badger writes about cities and urban policy.

If you try really hard, you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps.

If you pull yourself up by your bootstraps, your children will benefit from that too.

If children start from having the same advantages, they will have the same odds of success in life.

Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the United States.

50 years ago, we were much more willing to talk about race explicitly in this conversation.

You do not take a person who for years has been hobbled by chains and liberating,

bringing up to the starting line of a race and then say, you are free to compete with all the others.

And still, justly believe that you have been completely fair.

And this is the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights.

You know, the Civil Rights Act was about race.

Our Housing Act was about creating equal opportunity in the housing market for blacks and whites, people who had been discriminated against.

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