I was raised in a wealthy, liberal area of Brooklyn, which means that I did not grow up worrying about money, and that I atone for this sin by feeling terrible about it. I come from the milieu that produced the iconic image of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez at the 2021 Met Gala wearing a designer dress that demanded “Tax the Rich.” Like the Democratic congresswoman, I wish to enjoy the finer things in life—and for that I am very, very sorry.
So leave it to me, when I descended upon the Kentucky Derby earlier this month, to start asking everyone about wealth inequality. I wanted to know if anyone in this ostentatious and largely Republican crowd thought there was anything to the idea that America is anything less than a pure meritocracy.
My routine was to sidle up to some unsuspecting partygoer, make inoffensive small talk about our outfits, and then watch them edge steadily away from me as soon as I started feeling them out on tax policy. I soon discovered that politics at a horse race is about as welcome as flatulence at an orgy.
Not that that stopped me from making everyone uncomfortable, even those who were nice to me. One man in the famed Millionaires Row seats guided me through placing a bet on a racehorse, only to be rewarded with: “Thank you. Now, do you come from money?” He elected not to answer.
Not everyone was so reticent. I spoke to people from a range of backgrounds, including not just businessmen who’d inherited their fathers’ companies but people who’d grown up in poverty and achieved the American Dream. Their response generally went: If they could do it, can’t anyone?
I wanted to direct them to the neighborhood immediately surrounding Churchill Downs, where working-class residents sell food on the sidewalk or rent their driveways for parking space. Surprisingly, though, none of the six or seven working-class people I spoke with seemed all that interested in resenting the wealthy.
I asked one woman who was selling dollar hot dogs in her front yard if she thinks a lot about wealth inequality. “I really don’t,” she told me. “I just live by my means.” I asked another food seller if she had any resentment toward rich people: “Nah, I just want them to come over here and spend some of that rich money with me.” Another woman, thrilled to be working as a server to the millionaires, seemed positively scandalized by my efforts to get her to indulge any class resentment. “We’re not going to talk about that,” she told me. “We’re going to talk about my joy. . . and about how I want to progress.”
Or, as one drunk college-aged girl I met in the infield put it, “Why are we focusing on the negative?”
I asked her if she thought anyone so focused on the negative might have a point about. . . anything. She launched into a tirade, saying they just complain, “We don’t have this, we don’t have this, they have this, this is annoying.”
She said she has a different view. “We are living and we are breathing. That is a blessing. Enjoy it.”
I asked this girl if she knew anyone in the pricier seats. She told me her parents were in Millionaires Row.
If you like what you see, watch Ben’s previous dispatch: “Is America Racist? Reggae Fans Aren’t So Sure.” Click here to learn more about “Ben Meets America!”
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I feel like I'm just watching a weekly series where Ben ventures outside of his liberal echo chamber to find that he's been lied to his whole life with the ultimate conclusion being Ben becomes a Republican. Life is different in the real world, Ben.
I must admit I enjoy his videos. I find them quite amusing. This video reminded me not to conflate willingness to spend money with actual wealth. Very often they just are not related.