No one escapes the permanent underclass

Marco Borretti has written a sharp piece on the permanent underclass — that growing stratum of people who work, who pay taxes, who show up, but whose economic position barely budges year after year. The piece traces how this isn't an accident of bad luck so much as a structural feature of the economy.

What catches the eye is how Borretti frames it: the underclass isn't a temporary phase. It's becoming a permanent condition. Housing costs outpace wages. Education costs eat into savings. The ladder of upward mobility has grown taller, but the rungs have gotten further apart.

Why this matters for us:
La gente that works hard and still can't catch up isn't lazy — they're caught in a system that was built to keep them exactly where they are.