sociology 8

• to describe such inequalities among individuals and groups within human society
• key aspects: class, status, and power

social inequalities

extreme form of inequality in which certain people are owned as property by others

social system in which one's social status is bestowed for life

different social levels are closed so that all individuals must remain at the social level of their birth throughout life

marriage within one's social group as required by custom or law

• important for analyzing stratification in industrialized societies like in the US.
• large group of people who occupy a similar economic position in the wider society

are the opportunities you have for achieving economic prosperity

formula showing that inequality increases during the early stages of capitalist development, then declines, and eventually stabilizes at a relatively low level

refers to wages and salaries earned from paid occupations, plus unearned money from investments

refers to all the assets individuals own: cash, savings, and checking accounts, investments in stocks, bonds, real estate properties.

consists of the very wealthiest Americans-those households earning more than $157,185. or approx 5% of all American households.

catchall for a diverse group of occupations, lifestyles, and people who earn stable and sometimes substantial incomes at primarily white-collar jobs

• makes up about 20% of all American households.
• blue-collar and pink-collar laborers

which makes up roughly 15% of American households which includes those who work part time or not at all.

"beneath" the class system in that they lack access to the world of work and mainstream patterns of behavior

refers to the movement of individuals and groups between different class positions as a result of changes in occupation, wealth, or income

how far they move up or down the socioeconomic scale in the course of their working lives

• analyze where children are on the scare compared with their parents or grandparents
• mobility across the generation

there is an exchange of positions, such that more talented people in each generation move up the economic hierarchy, while the less talented move down.

upward mobility made possible by an expansion of better-paid occupations at the expense of more poorly paid ones

• societies become more open to movement between classes as they become more technological advanced
• as societies become more industrial, workers increasingly get jobs because of achievement

refers to placement in a particular social status based on characteristics such as family of origin, race, and gender

movement along the socioeconomic scale, nearly all of it was between occupational positions quite close to one another

moves from one job to another that is similar

• means that a person or family simply can't get enough to eat
• undernourished or may starve to death

• measure of inequality
• being poor compared with the stadards of living of the majority
• lacks the basic resources to maintain a decent standard of housing and healthy living conditions

income equal to 3x the cost of a nutritionally adequate diet

people who work but those earnings are not high enough to lift them above poverty

increase in the proportion of the poor who are female

• exists among many poor people
• poverty not a result of individual inadequacies but is instead the outcome of a larger social and cultural atmosphere into which successive generations of children are socialized

poor people who rely on govn. welfare provision rather than entering the labor market

• refers to new sources of inequality
• ways in which individuals may become cut off from involvement in the wider society

seen at the very bottom of the social hierarchy

means by which they gain a livelihood

those who earn their living by selling their labor to them, the working class

source of profit which capitalists are able to put to their own use

negatively privileged status groups, subject to discrimination that prevents them from taking advantage of opportunities open to others

• ambiguous groups
• managers and white-collar workers
• able to influence some aspects of production but are denied control over others

any process whereby groups try to maintain exclusive control over resources, limiting access to them