Status Anxiety

by Alain de Botton

In the United States, equality of opportunity was pursued with a special intensity. In March 1961, less than two months after assuming office, President John F. Kennedy established a Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity and charged it with ending employment discrimination in all its forms in government departments and private businesses. A series of specific laws followed: the Equal Pay Act (1963), the Civil Rights Act (1964), the Equal Employment Opportunity Act (1964), the Older Americans Act (1965), the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (1967), the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (1976) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990). With such legislation in place, it was plausible to believe, however old one happened to be and whatever one’s religion, colour or sex, that one would be guaranteed a fair chance of success.