People Are So Nice to You When You Have Money

Molly Crabapple has a cool essay at Vice about money and meritocracy. These lines jumped:

If you have money, you can pay to live in a bubble of politesse. Excellent wine choice, sir. Here’s your gift bag, madam. Often, you don’t have to pay for it. The mere promise that you might will keep you sipping prosecco and deserving of servile attentions. Soon, you think this treatment is earned.

Meanwhile, we treat the poor with casual cruelty. Single moms on welfare have their homes searched by police to make sure they’re not hiding a man in the closet. But it’s too much to ask bankers to justify the bonuses they sucked off the public teat. The poor get stop-and-frisk, drug tests, and constant distrust.

She opens the essay with the story of the time she flew first class on Virgin Air, the whole time kept totally separate from the general-boarding masses.

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