When it comes time to get a good job or start a business, the children of well-off Americans know who to call, while the children of poor Americans do not.

Thus, evening out the wealth distribution will require more than just transfers. It will require getting more poor and minority kids into good colleges, enforcing the Fair Housing Act to help neighborhoods desegregate faster, and other measures to help the children of the rich form strong social bonds with the children of the poor. Unless the basic shape of society is changed, the U.S. can probably expect wealth redistribution to produce the same fleeting results found in the history books. 

Noah Smith is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He was an assistant professor of finance at Stony Brook University, and he blogs at Noahpinion.

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