The reporter here totally ignores the possibility that the opposite might be true. Because blacks are more likely to favor government programs, they increase the likelihood that they will do no better than their parents.
I would state it this way. No one can devise a formula for getting rich. But I can devise a formula for getting poor. Don't work. Convince yourself that your life reflects the decisions of others and not yours. Be the perennial victim.
This is the toll that the welfare state has taken on blacks. It introduced a culture of poverty. Most Americans, regardless of race, trace their lineage to someone who was poor. Being poor is not a predictor of being in favor of government programs. However, thinking a government program is the answer to life's challenges is a good way to stay poor.
The American myth of the self-made man is somewhat of a distortion. It implies total independence. This is impossible. One needs to learn values somewhere and that place is generally family. The advantages of being born into a good family are, therefore, not news. A culture of merit is one in which individuals can carry the values they have absorbed with them into the marketplace and succeed.
The news of recent years is, rather, the encroachment on those values by the welfare state and the entitlement mentality. Blacks have been hurt particularly hard by this destructive culture, exacerbated by leaders who continue to preach it despite the facts. However, the welfare-state culture in America today goes well beyond the black community. It is this attitude that is increasingly freezing Americans in the circumstances in which they were born.
Freedom and capitalism do not reduce mobility. Mobility is lost as result of the belief that there is some path other than freedom and personal responsibility.