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McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 1
SOCIOLOGYRichard T. Schaefer
Stratification and Social Mobility
in the United States
9
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 29. Stratification and Social Mobility in the United
States• Understanding Stratification• Stratification by Social Class • Social Mobility • Social Policy and Stratification
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 3
Understanding Stratification
• Systems of Stratification– Ascribed Status: social position
assigned to person without regard for that person’s unique characteristics or talents
– Achieved Status: social position attained by person largely through his or her own effort
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 4
Understanding Stratification
• Systems of Stratification– Slavery: most extreme form of
legalized social inequality
– Castes: hereditary systems of rank, usually religiously dictated, that tend to be fixed and immobile
– Estate System: associated with feudal societies in the Middle Ages
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 5
Understanding Stratification
•Class System: social ranking based primarily on economic position in which achieved characteristics can influence social mobility
• Rossides (1997) uses five-class model to describe U.S. class system:
• Systems of Stratification– Social Classes
• Upper class • Working class • Upper-middle class • Lower class• Lower-middle class
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 6
Understanding Stratification
Figure 9-1. Household Income in the United States, 2001
Source: DeNavas-Walt and Cleveland 2002:15
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 7
Proletariat: working class
Understanding Stratification
• Perspectives on Stratification– Karl Marx’s View of Class
Differentiation• Social relations depend on who controls
the primary mode of productionBourgeoisie: capitalist class; owns the means of productionCapitalism: economic system in which the means of production are held largely in private hands and the main incentive for economic activity is the accumulation of profits
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 8
Understanding Stratification
• Perspectives on Stratification– Karl Marx’s View of Class
Differentiation•Class Consciousness: subjective
awareness of common vested interests and the need for collective political action to bring about change
•False Consciousness: attitude held by members of class that does not accurately reflect their objective position
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 9
Understanding Stratification
• Perspectives on Stratification– Max Weber’s View of Stratification
• No single characteristic totally defines a person’s position with the stratification system
Power: ability to exercise one’s will over others
Class: group of people who have similar level of wealth and income
Status Group: people who have the same prestige or lifestyle
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 10
Understanding Stratification
• Perspectives on Stratification– Interactionist View
• Interested in the importance of social class in shaping a person’s lifestyle
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 11
Understanding Stratification
• Is Stratification Universal?– Inequality exists in all societies—
even the simplest•Functionalist View
Social inequity necessary so people will be motivated to fill functionally important positions.
Does not explain the wide disparity between the rich and the poor
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 12
Understanding Stratification
• Is Stratification Universal?– Conflict View
• Human beings prone to conflict over scarce resources such as wealth, status, and power
• Stratification major sourceof societal tension andconflict that will inevitablylead to instability and social change
Dominant Ideology: set of cultural beliefs and practices that helps to maintain powerful social, economic, and political interests
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 13
Understanding Stratification
• Is Stratification Universal?– Lenski’s Viewpoint
• As a society advances technologically, it becomes capable of producing a considerable surplus of goods
• Emergence of surplus resources greatly expands possibilities for inequality in status, influence, and power
• Allocation of surplus goods and services reinforces social inequality
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 14
Understanding Stratification
Figure 9-2. Around the World: What’s a CEO Worth?
Source: Towers Perin Bryant 1999:Section 4, p. 1
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 15
Understanding Stratification
Table 9-1. Major Perspectives on Social Stratification
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 16
Stratification by Social Class
• Measuring Social Class– Objective Method
• Class largely viewed as a statistical category based on
– Occupation– Education– Income– Place of residence
Prestige: respect and admiration an occupation holds in society
Esteem: reputation specific person has earned within an occupation
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 17
– Gender and Occupational Prestige– Multiple Measures
• Wealth and Income– Income in U.S. distributed unevenly
• In 2001, richest fifth of the population held 84.5% of nation’s wealth
Stratification by Social Class
.
• Measuring Social Class
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 18
Stratification by Social Class
Table 9-2. PrestigeRankings of Occupations
Source: J. Davis et al. 2003
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 19
Stratification by Social Class
Figure 9-3. U.S. IncomePyramid, 2003
Source: Developed by author based on data from DeNavas-Walt et al. 2004; HINC-01 and the Internal Revenue Service
(2004)
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 20
Stratification by Social Class
Figure 9-4. Distribution of Wealth in the United States, 2001
Source: Wolff:2002
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 21
Stratification by Social Class
Figure 9-5. U.S. Minimum Wage Adjusted for Inflation, 1950—2005
Source: Author’s estimate and Bureau of the Census 2003a:425
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 22
Stratification by Social Class
• Poverty– Absolute poverty: minimum level
of subsistence that no family should live below
– Relative poverty: floating standard by which people at the bottom of a society are judged as being disadvantaged in comparison to the nation as a whole
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 23
Stratification by Social Class
• Poverty– Who Are the Poor?
• Not a static social class
– Explaining Poverty• In Gans’s view, poverty and poor satisfy
positive functions for many non poor groups
Life Chances: opportunities to provide material goods, positive living conditions, and favorable life experience
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 24
Stratification by Social Class
Figure 9-6. Absolute Poverty in Selected Industrial Countries
Source: Smeeding et al. 2001:51
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 25
Stratification by Social Class
Table 9-3. Who Are thePoor in the United Sates?
Source: DeNavas-Walt et al. 2004:10
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 26
Social Mobility
– Indicate social mobility in a society•Open System: position of each
individual influenced by the person’s achieved position
•Closed System: allows little or no possibility of moving up
• Open versus Closed Stratification Systems
Social Mobility: Movement of individuals or groups from one position in a society’s stratification system to another
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 27
Social Mobility
• Types of Social Mobility– Horizontal Mobility: movement
within same range of prestige– Vertical Mobility: movement from
one position to another of a different rank
– Intragenerational Mobility: social position changes within person’s adult life
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 28
Social Mobility
• Social Mobility in the United States– Occupational Mobility– The Impact of Education– The Impact of Race and Ethnicity– The Impact of Gender
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 29
Social Policy and Stratification
• Government and Poverty– The Issue
• Governments searching for right solution to welfare
– How much subsidy?– How much responsibility should poor assume?
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 30
Social Policy and Stratification
• Government and Poverty– The Setting
• Shifts in U.S. welfare program in 1996• Most countries devote higher proportions
of expenditures to– Housing– Social security– Welfare– Health care– Unemployment compensation
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 31
Social Policy and Stratification
• Government and Poverty– Sociological Insights
• Many sociologists view debate over welfare reform from conflict perspective
•Corporate Welfare: tax breaks, direct payments, and grants the government makes to corporations
McGraw-Hill © 2007 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 32
Social Policy and Stratification
• Government and Poverty– Policy Initiatives
• Prospect for hard-core jobless faded• In North America and Europe, people
beginning to turn to private means to support themselves
• People seeing gap between themselves and the affluent grow with fewer government programs to assist them