Thomas Edsall has an excellent piece on growing educational stratification in America, specifically how access to higher education is increasingly being denied to the children of the less affluent. And as he says, this is very much about policy. One graphic he links to (ppt) but doesn’t include is just stunning: here’s the declining value of Pell grants compared with college costs:

Next time someone tells you that he’s in favor of equality of opportunity, not equality of results, ask him whether he proposes to reverse the decline in Pell grants and other programs giving educational opportunity to the less fortunate. If he demurs, he’s a hypocrite.