A worse scandal is K-12 education, where geographic segregation by income is leaving poor school districts partly reliant on local property taxes, which don't generate much revenue with fewer resources per pupil than richer districts.
Race is involved. School districts that are predominantly white get $23 billion more funding each year than districts serving mostly students of color.
When it comes to early childhood education which education experts agree is vital to the future life chances of the very young, the gap has become a chasm.
Wealthy parents spare no expense stimulating infant and toddler brains with happy human interactions through words, music, poetry, games, and art. Too often, the offspring of poorer kids do little more than sit long hours in front of a television.
The monstrous concentration of wealth in America has not only created an education system in which the rich can effectively buy college admission for their children. It has distorted much else.
It has created a justice system in which the rich can buy their way out of prison. (Exhibit A: money manager Jeffrey Epstein, who sexually abused dozens of underage girls, yet served just 13 months in a private wing of a Palm Beach county jail.)
It has spawned a political system in which the rich can buy their way into Congress (Exhibit B: Reps. Darreill Issa and Greg Gianforte) and even into the presidency. (Donald Trump, perhaps Starbuck's Howard Schultz).
And a health care system in which the super-rich can buy care unavailable to others (concierge medicine).
Meritocracy remains a deeply held ideal in America. But The nation is drifting ever-farther away from it. In the age of Trump, it seems, everything is for sale.
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