Why I wrote Inheritocracy

Knowing that life is increasingly a lottery of birth is not debilitating but empowering....

After a long summer hiatus I am back with the #majorrelate newsletter. Now my youngest child is in school, I have Fridays all to myself which is a novel feeling…… and I’m choosing to spend it writing this newsletter.

I’m now in full publicity mode for my book Inheritocracy: It’s Time to Talk About The Bank of Mum and Dad. These past two weeks I have penned an article for the Observer, Telegraph, had interviews with the The Times and New Statesman all out to coincide with its publication on the 26th September. I have also spent a week recording the audiobook which will be released in late October.

All of this publicity is fun and it is nice to put something out into the world that you are proud of, but I’m someone who loves the process more than the sell. Now there is nothing quite like signing your own book, but for me, most of the satisfaction comes from the researching and writing stage. And that leads me to why I wrote this book.

I have always believed that I have worked hard but I’ve gradually come to realise that so much of any success I have had has been down to the safety net and the springboard my parents provided. That sounds naive I know but let’s remember we were raised in a 21st century culture where we were told that exams, qualifications, degrees were a pathway to success. But, as more of us became graduates, the price of a degree went up and the value of it went down.

Opportunity for young people was not just about our talents; it increasingly was dependent on our parents’ capacity to invest in those talents. One in three pupils currently have a private tutor while school places have long been dictated by catchment areas and house prices. The idea that state education is a level playing field does not chime with reality. Tertiary education too with high fees and increasing upfront costs is ever more determined by parents’ wealth. ?Some universities are not an option for those without the Bank of Mum and Dad. These students are choosing home over residential degrees, many work full time, take on more debt and end up paying a lot more for the same qualification due to the long-term interest on the loan.

Likewise, millennial middle class women grew up with no less powerful and influential narrative, with our mothers and grandmothers whispering in our ear ‘go and do what we couldn’t’. Even though we continued to be constrained by the patriarchy, we grew up believing that we could do anything and not to be dependent on a man either for our success or finances. This made sense in an era defined by rising divorce. And we fulfilled this ambition. We are individualists, we are financially empowered. But the truth was that female middle class success has in many 21st century cases been funded or enabled by parental support and wealth.

The decline of the male breadwinner is linked to the rise of the Bank of Mum and Dad. Tellingly, I interviewed a millennial woman who had a joint bank account with her mother but not her long term partner; and I interviewed several women who felt that they did not want to be financially dependent on a man but were willing to admit they were continually and perpetually financially dependent on their parents. Unexpectedly, you could say that modern women are even more defined by familial obligations than our mother’s generation, whom the second-wave feminists sought to free from precisely these constraints.

Both points - the false promise of education and the shake up of financial dynamics between the genders points to why I wrote this book. In society we subscribe to certain narratives that are not always true. I wanted to discover the economic story that has been the main backdrop to Millennials and Gen Z and that is the changing nature of the relationship between parents and their offspring. The culture of over parenting, investment, support and springboard that wealthy parents now offer goes against what most of them experienced with their own parents, but is understandable in an economy where it is so difficult to get ahead under your own steam. But it is creating an ever greater wealth divide….

In short I wrote a book that I wanted to read that cut through all the crap of humble brags on social media and talked about the uncomfortable reality of how our economy actually works and what forces have actually shaped our generation;

• How are parents became the gatekeepers to adulthood……
• Why the dating game today is dictated by wealth and class more than it was for our parents……
• Why women are more likely than men to see any inheritance and wealth as their own even when in a couple…..
• How your class today is more defined by your wealth rather than your income, education, background or profession….
• Why the wealthy are the only ones able to work in professions ‘they love’ with low wages. Why the most loyal employees are the ones supporting their parents.
• Why any inheritance some are hoping for will be gobbled up by social care and why those who have had an early inheritance are the fortunate ones.
• Why millennials will potentially spend more time looking after their parents than their kids.

The book itself is a memoir in which I show how my life has been shaped by these macro-trends - but mine is just one of many stories in the book. Those who have made it on their own, those who recognise they received too much help, those who resent an economy seemingly stacked against them, those who have subverted the lottery of birth. I wanted to write a book that forced our generation, especially women, to address their obvious frustrations and to question the narratives we were fed about our careers, partnerships, money, family and more. I found a lot of frustrated women out there, frustrated about their ability to find a partner, their struggles as female breadwinners, their dependency on their parents or their in-laws, their lack of financial security when it came to children and of course housing, and their looming dread when it comes to looking after their elderly parents and potentially in-laws.

The 20th century pathway our parents told us would work is no longer a reality for most of us. The message in the book is ‘let’s get to grips with how the world actually works now, not how our parents or we thought it would be’. It is only when we are properly open about this that we can then begin to either collectively destroy it, or individually subvert it. Knowledge, as they say, is power.

Still haven’t pre-ordered it? Here’s what others are saying:

“Eliza Filby’s nuanced, witty and evidence-driven book explains how we arrived where we are as a country today when it comes to the pivotal role families play in the foundations of economic success. Peppered with warm and thoughtful anecdotes from Filby’s own journey, Inheritocracy offers a new and innovative insight into the inherent advantages offered to those who can rely on family financial support and the real-life consequences felt by those who cannot. Bringing together contributions from economists to authors to politicians, this book offers a compelling analysis from start to finish.”

--Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London

“Inheritocracy is both funny and important – it’s like a mash-up between Dolly Alderton and The Economist. Filby beautifully unpicks the major obstacles to growing up in the twenty-first century. Her book deserves to be read by every young person… and their parents.”

--Rowan Pelling, co-editor of Perspective

“This is a very welcome book on one of the biggest social changes in Britain today – the growing significance of inheritance. Eliza Filby shows, with vivid personal examples, how this is transforming the relationship between successive generations.”

--David Willetts, author of The Pinch: How the Baby Boomers Took Their Children’s Future – And Why They Should Give It Back

“Inheritocracy is that most valuable thing: a subtle, thorough, insightful look at a subject we all tend to shy away from. Filby is by turns funny, informative and familiar; we’re lucky to have her.”

--Nell Frizzell, author of The Panic Years

To pre-order my book Inheritocracy: It’s Time to Talk about the Bank of Mum and Dad (published 26th September). Go on, you know you want to!

Thanks for reading

Eliza