This post is copied directly from the blog "Ways of Thinking" by Chris Salituro

 I wanted to post the link to Chris' blog here, but I was afraid no one would open it, so I am copying and pasting the entire blog entry from Chris:

 "The rules are there are no Rules"

The quote above is from the movie Grease, but it reflects the common thinking about the American class system. That is, most Americans believe that there are no rules in America and anything is possible. "Only in America" is a common myth. The reality is that there are rules to the class system, but few Americans see it (then again, few have a sociological imagination!). The rules are as follows:

Income: the highest earning Americans have continued to earn more and more over the last 50 years, while the lower earners have earned closer to about the same. The more money you have, the more you can earn. This video (though politicized) is an accurate portrayal of income inequality in America. This graph displays the inequality by occupation.
Checkout this post from Slate about income inequality. You can scroll down a bit and enter your zipcode and see where it stands by comparison.
This map shows the inequality present in countries around the world. The bluer countries are more equal and the more red are less equalNotice how many countries are more equal than the United States.

Wealth: the wealthiest Americans have an enormous amount of wealth compared to the average American. The disparity is greater than that of income. Here is a visual representation of disparate wealth is.

Education: This link shows that on average, the higher a family's income, the higher the ACT score. And this link shows the higher one's educational level, the more he or she earns. Here is a post from sociological images that has a lot of info showing the connection between your degree and your income. This graph shows that the less education that parents have, the less education their children obtain.

Location: The price of a home depends on a lot more than the physical structure of the home.

Race: There is a much larger percentage of black and hispanic minorities in poverty than whites, although the actual number of whites is higher because there are that many more whites.

Here is a link to 15 statistics about inequality in America.