Social Mobility and Climbing the Social Ladder

What is social mobility? It is basically a change in a person's social class. It can be a change towards an upper class, or a decline towards the lower class. This can be brought on by many causes, but mostly through our own efforts. There are some exceptions to this though. Take for instance, if a major company suddenly goes bankrupt and all of its workers become jobless, although some may recover soon, others will not. This will cause some of these employees to move down in social class because they are unemployed, and might have to take a menial job until they can find a better one. At the same time others may find even better jobs than they had before, these people will move up the social ladder. At some point in their lives, most people will experience some sort of social mobility.

My experience with social mobility has been a roller coaster. When I was younger my family was pretty much poor, living in a rented apartment, and driving an old but somewhat reliable car. My parents were living check to check, with no savings, and no healthcare. Then one day my dad got injured at work, he shattered his right elbow. We thought we couldn't get any worse, but it did. My dad couldn't work for over a year, while he completed his recovery. Workers comp sounds nice to some, but in reality it doesn't pay the bills. My dad's boss advised him to get a lawyer and file a lawsuit, since the accident was caused by unsafe working conditions. This took another year or so, and we steadily fell down the social ladder from poor to poorer. Then one day my dad gave us the great news that they settled out of court. Of course it wasn't anywhere near as much money as we would have got if we went to trial, but we couldn't wait anymore. We came out with enough money to give a down payment to buy out first house, and move out of the slummy neighborhood we were living in. We now became part of a new homeowners community. My dad found a better job than he had before the accident, and both my sister and I began working. Needless to say we moved up in the world and have been constantly taking steps in right direction. God bless America.