U.S.A., Land of Limitations? by Nicholas Kristof

A.     “Rich kids make a lot of bad choices,” Professor Reardon notes. “They just don’t come with the same sort of consequences.”

This quote simply explains the cycle of life in the US. Wealthy people mistakes or bad choices in life are quickly unscramble because their well positions and resources get them back in their feet. But on the other hand, if a person with low income makes bad choices mostly the period to reestablish would take longer or in some cases it might never be the same as before. My brother for example, he had his first daughter when he was 19. Having that responsibility on his hands, my brother had to drop out of college and go work full time to take care of anything his daughter needed. 

B.     “Yet I fear that by 2015 we’ve become the socially rigid society our forebears fled, replicating the barriers and class gaps that drove them away.”

Many families leave their native country hoping to progress and have a better life in the United States. What Kristof explain in his work is that the US has turned into a country where depending on your economic status people are limited to socially progress. For example illegal immigrants, they are limited to many of the opportunities that this country provides for others (high paying jobs, ability to drive, getting highly educated, etc). In other words they fled their countries to have less openings for greater things.

C.     “Sean Reardon of Stanford University has calculated that the race gap in student test scores has diminished, but that the class gap has widened.”

In this sentence Kristof explains how things change from your skin color giving you further opportunities to social class instead. How being white before was a clear path to success now being in a higher social class is the key. People in other countries think of the United States as the land of opportunities but it's more like "the land of limitations" like the tittle of the readings says.