101 SOC - Principles of Sociology Lecture Notes #10 Social Class and Social Inequality in the United States 1) Social Inequality - Introduction.
Social Inequality or social stratification means unequal or uneven access to resources and opportunities in society. Social stratification is the ranking of a population into unequal strata or layers. (Stratification is a term used in geology to refer to layers of rock--placed one above the other.) The ranked categories of people in society have unequal or uneven access to important social resources in society such as wealth, power and prestige. Such ranked groups may also be treated unfairly. Social stratification and social inequality are used interchangeably.
Valued or important social resources in any society include wealth, power, and prestige (or social honor). In unequal societies, individuals, groups or classes have uneven access to valued resources and opportunities.
Also, in stratified societies, social groups or classes tend to receive fair or unfair treatment before the law.
2) Origins of Inequality in Society.
Jacque Rousseau (the French natural philosopher) in his book, The Second Discourse, traces the origin of social inequality in society to the institution of private property and private/individual ownership of the means of production. This creates a situation of 'haves' and 'have nots'.
Because wealth, power and prestige are scarce resources in any society, these valued resources constitute the basis of inequality and competition or conflict between groups, classes or among individuals.
Rousseau, in The State of Nature, argues that there was no social inequality before society and private property emerged. Hence, society and private
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property are responsible for social inequality in society. (Karl Marx advocates the elimination of private property to create equality and cooperation in society.)
Differences in physical strength, skills or talents existed in the State of Nature-but did not lead to social inequality as these attributes were used to benefit both the individuals and the community.
3) Theoretical Perspectives of Social Inequality.
There are two major theoretical perspectives of social inequality: a. The Functionalist Perspective, and b. The Conflict Perspective.
The Functional Perspective of Inequality explains inequality in terms of the functions it performs for the society as a whole. It argues that some individuals or groups in society must be unevenly rewarded for their talents, efforts and motivation.
Individuals or people with qualities, talents or skills that are most needed and valued in society must be given more rewards or benefits than the rest. It is assumed that individuals with the most ability in society use their skills for the well-being of all (rather than for self-interest or self-enrichment).
Thus, people with the most valued and needed qualities or those with the greatest ability deserve greater or more rewards in terms of respect, power and wealth (or material goods) than people of lesser or average talent, skill or ability.
The Functional Perspectives considers inequality in society to be serving a positive value or function, e.g. providing collective survival for society as a whole. Inequality is also seen as motivating or rewarding individual achievement and promoting societal progress. (Consider the article by
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Herbert J. Gans, "The Uses of Poverty: The Poor Pay All", Chapter 33 in the Reader.)
According to Gans, Americans consider poverty to be undesirable. And the American society is capable of eliminating poverty by guaranteeing a certain level of income/benefits for all the poorest members of society. Yet poverty persists in the midst of wealth. (Thirty-five million Americans live below the poverty level and there are 47 million without health insurance.)
Gans suggests that poverty persists in American society because it is functional, i.e. it helps to maintain the stability of the entire society. In particular, poverty helps to justify claims of individual hard efforts and success or blame for those who fail (while leaving the social system in tact.)
Gans argues that it would require an act of political will or courage to redistribute wealth and income from the rich to the poor. (See Figure 10.5, the U.S. Social Ladder, p. 277, main text.) And since the rich, not the poor, have political power, it is not in their economic interests to eliminate poverty once and for all. (President Lyndon B. Johnson's "War on Poverty" in the 1960s failed because the Vietnam War and social programs competed for available funds.)
The rich are said to engage in token or symbolic efforts aimed at addressing the effects (not real causes) of poverty. Thus, the elimination of poverty in the U.S. is unlikely unless the relationship between the rich and poor changes in favor of the poor. (It is unclear how this would happen.)
The Conflict Perspective of Social Inequality. Conflict theorists consider social inequality to be the result of competition for scarce social resources in society. In most situations, powerful individuals, groups or classes already control both resources and ideas. (For example, Bill Gates, a co-founder of the Microsoft Corporation, with a fortune of $49billion, is the second wealthiest person in the world, see p. 277 in the main text.) Hence, such powerful individuals or
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classes already have an advantage. And competition for valued resources is considered both unequal and unfair.
Karl Marx argues that the dominant ideas of an era are usually those of its dominant class or classes. And since ideas are "social products", dominant classes or groups in society control the production of cultural symbols, economic production and political power. Such cultural symbols include beliefs, values and ideas of justice.
People who own or control the media in the U.S. also tend to dominate the educational system and to influence the political process. (This is called ideological hegemony.) It is these same powerful, privileged groups/classes that promote definitions of social reality that justify their own positions. (For example, newsworthy events and priorities are determined by the mass media, both print and TV media. Increasingly, the internet as a source of news is becoming important, sometimes reinforcing the mass media or undercutting it.)
The Conflict Perspective looks at structural characteristics of the economy such as the following: a. Distribution of occupations (e.g. how many openings for particular jobs). b. Degree of unionization of labor. (In the U.S., 12% of the labor force is unionized; in Canada it is 32%). c. Extent of the service economy or manufacturing sector, (in the U.S. the service economy is 80% of the labor force and manufacturing is 12%) to show payments and benefits employees receive.
All of these factors create and sustain inequality among various categories of occupations, employees and sectors of the economy (more to be discussed under 'Work and Economy').
4) Stratification Systems. There are two major social stratification systems: a) caste; and b) class or social class.
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Caste. A caste system is a closed system based on ascribed status (e.g. birth). It is closed because there are no chances of changing one's social position in such a society.
A caste system promotes "endogamy"--i.e. marriage within the same social group, category or caste. In addition, caste societies (such as India) recognize or accept 'ritual pollution'--certain types of contact or proximity between members of different castes are prohibited because they are considered to 'contaminate' members of the upper/superior caste by the lower castes (such as the 'untouchables'.
Caste distinctions in India are linked to the division of labor or economic activities such as trading, weaving, cultivating, performing unskilled labor or political leadership. India has five castes: a. Brahmins - highest caste consisting of priests and scholars or their descendants. b. Second highest caste of nobles and warriors/soldiers or their descendants. c. Third caste of merchants and skilled artisans. d. Fourth caste of common or unskilled laborers. e. Fifth caste of outcasts, 'untouchables' or lowest of the low caste.
The fourth and fifth castes are generally considered the lowest castes in India. In major cities such as New Delhi, the caste distinctions are not as clear cut as in rural areas. Today, India is moving from a caste-based society to one based on social class. However, such a transition is both slow and filled with controversies and conflicts. The Indian Federal Government has enacted legislation that allows educated/qualified lower caste members to take up federal jobs through an Affirmative Action style program. (But this has been difficult to implement due to persistent and intense protest from members of the upper caste including upper caste university students.)
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Class. A class is an open system of social stratification based primarily on economic and occupational roles of people. Boundaries between classes are often not clear-cut.
In a class system, an individual's social position is usually determined by the economic position of the family household--the head of household or bread winner and the person's own achievement.
Very often people may rise above or fall below the class of their parents. (Read chapter 34 in the Reader; also look at social mobility considered later.) Individuals may also marry someone of another class. (This happens less often between upper class and other classes in the U.S.) Class membership often represents the 'achieved status' because it depends to a large extent on talents, efforts, and achievements of individuals. Because of this, individuals have some control over their achieved status (e.g. level of education, income or occupation).
5) Social Class and Class Analysis.
There are two major perspectives of social class: a) Karl Marx's Analysis of Class, and b) Max Weber's Analysis of Social Class. Karl Marx's Analysis of Class. Marx stressed the economic basis of classes by considering relations of production rather than individual characteristics or social positions.
Marx defined a class as all those people who share a common relationship to the means of economic production. According to Marx, there are two classes--the dominant class or the owners of the means of production (i.e. capitalists/bourgeoisie) and the subordinate class made up of workers (or the proletariat).
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In a capitalist society and economy, the relationship between the two classes is characterized by inequality, exploitation and class conflict or class struggle which is considered inevitable.
Capitalists or the bourgeoisie are the dominant class that controls the profit/surplus value or wealth produced by the workers. This exploitation is the main source of class conflict and basis for changing society.
Marx's view of class was shaped by the times and conditions in which he lived while in self-exile in Manchester, England. This was a time during the Industrial Revolution when industry was owned and controlled by individual capitalists and the vast majority of the population was made up of poorly a paid labor force living under harsh conditions.
Marx's analysis of class struggle leading to revolutionary change has not worked in the West including the U.S. due to several reasons: the emergence of the Welfare State, a streamlined grievance process and the intersection of class with gender and ethnicity (blunting the development of "working class consciousness").
Max Weber's Analysis of Social Class. Max Weber was aware of Karl Marx's class analysis focusing on relationships to the economic means of production in society. Weber considered social class as a large group of people who relate to each other in terms of wealth, power and prestige (or social honor). Weber divided the concept of social class into three distinct but interrelated parts as follows: a. Wealth or economic status. b. Prestige or social status. c. Power or political status.
Such a broad definition of social class allowed for the possibility that an individual or group may rank highly on the indicator/dimension of one class
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membership, and lower on the other two. (Compare a truck driver with a school principal and a United States Senator on the three dimensions.)
In real life situations, wealth, prestige and power go together or are closely associated because one of them can often be converted into either of the other two. People with wealth in a class society have power and high status or prestige. (Two-thirds of U.S. Senators are millionaires or multi-millionaires compared to 20% of U.S. Congress members.)
Weber's analysis of class has enabled sociologists and other social scientists to study class membership using the concept of socioeconomic status (or SES).
The SES takes into account important objective factors such as: a. Level of income. b. Level of education. c. Occupation or profession. d. Residence/neighborhood.
These factors are used to determine class or social positions of individuals or groups in society.
It is on the basis of the SES that Gilbert and Kahl (1993) were able to describe the following class structure in America and other capitalist countries.
6) The American Class Structure.
Sociologists, Gilbert and Kahl, used Weber's class model (based on SES) to describe the class structure in the U.S. and other capitalist countries. Both Gilbert and Kahl (1993) identified six classes in the U.S. as follows: a. The capitalist or upper class (1% of 330 million people). b. The upper middle class (15%). c. The lower middle class (32%). d. The working class (32%).
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e. The working poor (16%). f. The under class (4%).
The Capitalist or Upper Class. The upper class in the U.S. is very small making up 1% of the U.S. population. Its members own most of the U.S. wealth and they are worth more than what the bottom 90% of the nation owns.
The upper class is the most powerful group of people in the U.S. Their power is so great that their decisions open or close job opportunities or life chances for millions of other Americans. This is because they own or control the most powerful corporations in the U.S. (including the Fortune 500 companies--the largest U.S. corporations such as GM, Ford, Microsoft, Exxon, IBM, AT & T, etc.).
The upper class consists of people who have inherited wealth (95% of them inherited their wealth; that is they did not earn it or work for it) and those who have recently become wealthy (especially since 1980s onward); hence, "old" and "new" money.
In 1999, the gap between the rich and the poor in the U.S. continued to widen even to the present day. For example, the wealthiest 2.7 million Americans had about $620 billion to spend after taxes. It would take 100 million of the poorest Americans to have the same amount to spend after taxes. In 1999, one percent of Americans with the highest income shared 13% of all revenue.
The upper class and upper middle class lead a distinctive lifestyle and dominate U.S. economic, political and cultural institutions including education. (For details, read Stephen Higley's, "The U.S. Upper Class", in Chapter 35 of the Reader.)
The Upper Middle Class makes up about 15% of the U.S. population. They are composed of high-income professionals and upper managers (including current and former national network news anchors, e.g. Dan Rather of CBS, the late Peter Jennings of ABC, and Tom Brokaw of NBC).
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The members of this class are concerned with their own careers and business advancement. They also have high aspirations for their children. Almost all of them are the newly rich especially from the 1980s to present (including the dot.Com entrepreneurs that have gone bust).
Most members of this class are college or university-educated professionals or business executives/entrepreneurs. Frequently, many possess advanced academic or professional degrees or credentials.
The Lower Middle Class constitutes 32% to 34% of the U.S. population. They are composed of middle or lower level managers and other average income people such as small business owners, teachers, nurses, sales representatives, etc.
Members of this class share most aspirations and values of the upper middle class, but sometimes lack the educational or economic resources or opportunities that would also them to enjoy the same lifestyle. (Most have at least a high school education.)
The Working Class constitutes 32% of the U.S. population. This class is composed of blue collar factory workers (often unionized and relatively well paid) and low paid white and pink collar workers. (Note: pink collar workers are women; white collar workers work in offices or the service economy.)
The majority of people in the working class are people of color, women, and less educated whites. Most possess a GED or high school diploma and hope to get ahead by achieving seniority on the job rather than through college education or changing the type of work or jobs.
Members of this class take great pride in being respectable and putting in a hard day's work. (Two years ago, miners trapped in a mine in Philadelphia vowed to return to work.) (Read Lilian Rubin's book, Pain, about the lives and experiences of working class families in the San Francisco Bay Area--lives that
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were characterized by social and economic hardships including domestic violence, drugs and lack of money.)
The Working Poor make up about 16% of the U.S. population. They work in unskilled, low-paying, dead-end or temporary/seasonal jobs. Most are high school drop outs.
Most work in minimum wage jobs, especially in the service sector and most have difficulty making ends meet at the end of each month. Therefore, they live from pay check to pay check and have great difficulty making their monthly bills. (This is also true for most members of the lower middlle class as well.)
Most of the working poor work full time; some try to hold down more than one job at any given time. In families of the working poor, more than one adult works and they pool financial incomes together for survival.
The Under Class constitutes about 4% of the U.S. population. The lower or under class (term coined by William Wilson, prominent African American Sociologist formerly at the University of Chicago and now at Harvard University) include the permanently unemployed and unemployable, who lack education and skills, the homeless, welfare recipients and their dependents, and other disadvantaged or poor people in inner cities often considered "worthless" by mainstream society (especially middle class members).
The 1996 Welfare Reform Law passed by both the Senate and House and signed by President Clinton forced many welfare recipients to do minimum wage jobs in order to receive their welfare checks (i.e. so-called "workfare"). And in most states, after two to five years on welfare, recipients are forced to find employment. Most "new homeless" include whole families of welfare recipients and dependents who are no longer eligible for welfare checks due to the Welfare Reform of 1996. In order for states or local governments to certify that they have reduced the rolls of welfare recipients in their jurisdictions, they
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may resort to giving one-way bus tickets to enable former welfare recipients to go to other counties or states. 7) Social Mobility.
Social mobility is the movement from one social status/social position to another. Such movement can be up or down the social ladder. This is only possible in a class-based system (not a caste system). There are three types of social mobility: a. Intergenerational mobility. b. Exchange mobility. c. Structural mobility.
Intergenerational mobility is the movement up or down the social ladder experienced by family members from one generation to another (initially tracked as father-to-son, nowadays includes mother-to-daughter). Example: children of working class families becoming middle class professionals. (Read Chapter 34 in the Reader where Morris and Grimes argue that despite obstacles such as economic deprivation or deficit/lack of cultural capital, some determined working class students move up into the middle class. Both authors were sociology professors who moved from working class backgrounds to the middle class--but still did not feel right completely.)
An individual in the middle class may also "slide" into the working class or even the under class (if they lose their jobs or livelihood/income due to an economic crisis).
Exchange mobility or vertical social mobility involves changes in people's social status or social positions as they exchange places with one another at different levels of the social ladder. (Compare to the movie "Trading Places", starring Eddie Murphy.) In such situations, incompetent but high status people lose jobs and fall to lower status, while competent lower status people rise up
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the social ladder to replace them. This is common in professional and competitive collegiate sports--coaches are fired and sometimes replaced by their assistants after a game loss, etc.
Exchange social mobility accounts only for a small percentage of social movement in modern societies. Structural mobility is the most important form of social mobility. It entails changes in people's social positions due to changes in the structure of the economy. This may occur in two ways. First, mechanization and automation may pull many people from lower status jobs into higher status jobs in the service economy. This happens due to economic factors beyond individual efforts and talents, (e.g. a clerk becomes a computer programmer, etc.). Second, an economic crisis/downturn/recession may lead people in high status jobs to take lower status jobs (sometimes called a "white collar recession") or becoming unemployed. This may happen during periods of the so-called "jobless recovery" as well.
The most common form of mobility in modern societies is structural mobility. But in all class-based societies, even open ones in terms of social stratification, social mobility is limited, benefiting some individuals or groups but not all. Hence, most people remain within the social class of their parents or guardians (recycling class structure and social inequality).
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