a two-tier society, with the virtuous Vickies behaving themselves and keeping each other in check, and the other types reverting to the Somalia that Kennaway etc so fervently desire

David Brooks Says

I personally call this phenomenon "the Regressive Cost of Virtue" (virtue in the descriptive, not the normative sense). Too lazy to write a good comment on it, I'll just quote myself from IRC.

06:00 < Multiheaded> anyway, the thesis: not only is poverty insanely cognitively expensive, etc, but wealth and cultural capital are very very good for you. not only can you afford to buy virtue, but crucially it's easy and not painful to desire to buy virtue. like crazy work/study hours, responsible substance use, etc.
06:01 < Multiheaded> http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-5-stupidest-habits-you-develop-growing-up-poor/
06:01 < Multiheaded> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/science/the-rational-choices-of-crack-addicts.html
06:01 < Multiheaded> http://killermartinis.kinja.com/why-i-make-terrible-decisions-or-poverty-thoughts-1450123558/1469687530
06:07 < Multiheaded> note: naturally, there is much less written about the... cultural luxury of the rich and how awesome it is than about the culture of poverty. except by conservatives, who are awed at how inherently virtuous the elites seem to be, not noticing the regressive cost of virtue.
06:07 < Multiheaded> rightists say that the elites profess liberal values but are good hard-working conservatives at heart. i say that they profess liberalism but really just go with the flow in daily life and the "flow" is mostly determined by material circumstances, not memetics, even though it does shape behaviour
06:09 < Multiheaded> http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/03/other-peoples-pathologies/359841/
06:09 < Multiheaded> http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/04/black-pathology-crowdsourced/360190/