This article is a brief personal reflection on the state of research into the relation between education and social mobility. Quantitative methods are both essential and advancing in this field. Sociologists seek scientific solutions but achieve ethical neutrality only with difficulty because all are tempted to bias from social and political background. I commend the political arithmetic tradition but summarise possible sources of distortion in my own biography. Finally I go beyond the boundaries of scientific social science to advocate social policies which might result in a fairer and more equal society.