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Slide 1

SOCIOLOGYRichard T. Schaefer

Stratification and Social Mobility

in the United States

9

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Slide 29. Stratification and Social Mobility in the United

States• Understanding Stratification• Stratification by Social Class • Social Mobility • Social Policy and Stratification

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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

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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

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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

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Understanding Stratification

Figure 9-1. Household Income in the United States, 2001

Source: DeNavas-Walt and Cleveland 2002:15

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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

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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

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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

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Slide 10

Understanding Stratification

• Perspectives on Stratification– Interactionist View

• Interested in the importance of social class in shaping a person’s lifestyle

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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

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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

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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

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Slide 14

Understanding Stratification

Figure 9-2. Around the World: What’s a CEO Worth?

Source: Towers Perin Bryant 1999:Section 4, p. 1

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Slide 15

Understanding Stratification

Table 9-1. Major Perspectives on Social Stratification

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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

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– 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

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Slide 18

Stratification by Social Class

Table 9-2. PrestigeRankings of Occupations

Source: J. Davis et al. 2003

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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)

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Slide 20

Stratification by Social Class

Figure 9-4. Distribution of Wealth in the United States, 2001

Source: Wolff:2002

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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

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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

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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

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Slide 24

Stratification by Social Class

Figure 9-6. Absolute Poverty in Selected Industrial Countries

Source: Smeeding et al. 2001:51

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Slide 25

Stratification by Social Class

Table 9-3. Who Are thePoor in the United Sates?

Source: DeNavas-Walt et al. 2004:10

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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

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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

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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

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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?

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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

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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

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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