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Slide 1
Richard T. Schaefer
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
9
Slide 2
Stratification and
Social Mobility in the United States
• Systems of Stratification
• Sociological Perspectives on Stratification
• Is Stratification Universal?
• Stratification by Social Class
• Income and Wealth
• Poverty
• Life Chances
• Social Mobility
• Social Policy and Stratification:
Executive Compensation
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 3
A Look Ahead
█
█
█
Is social inequality an
inescapable part of society?
How does government policy affect
the life chances of the working poor?
Is this country still a place
where a hardworking person
can move up the social ladder?
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 4
Stratification and Social Mobility
in the United States
█
Social inequality: Condition in which
members of society have different
amounts of wealth, prestige, or power
– Stratification: Structured ranking of entire
groups of people that perpetuates unequal
economic rewards and power in a society
– Income: Salaries and wages
– Wealth: Encompasses all
of a person’s material assets
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Slide 5
Systems of Stratification
█
█
Ascribed status: social position assigned
to person by society without regard for the
person’s unique talents or characteristics
Achieve status: social
position that person
attains largely through
his or her own efforts
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Slide 6
Systems of Stratification
█
Slavery: Individuals owned by other
people, who treat them as property
Castes: Hereditary ranks,
usually religiously dictated and
tend to be fixed and immobile
█ Estates (feudalism): Peasants worked
land leased to them in exchange for
military protection and other services
█
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Slide 7
Figure 9-1: The 50 States:
Contrasts in Income and Poverty Levels
Note: National median household income was $51,168;
national poverty rate, 14.3 percent.
Source: 2009 census data presented in American Community
Survey 2010: Tables R1701, R1901.
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Slide 8
Table 9-1: Human Trafficking Report
Note: Table is incomplete; each tier lists only a sample of all nations classified. Since the Human Trafficking Report is created by
the State Department, the level of compliance by the United States, although not listed, would presumably be “full compliance.”
Source: Department of State 2010.
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Slide 9
Social Classes
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:
█
– Upper class
– Upper-middle class
– Lower-middle class
– Working class
– Lower class
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Slide 10
Social Classes
█
Upper class: 1% to 2% of U.S. population
█
Lower class: 10% to 25% of U.S. population
█
█
█
Upper middle class: 10% to
15% of U.S. population
Lower middle class: 30%
to 35% of U.S. population
Working class: 40% to
45% of U.S. population
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Slide 11
Social Classes
█
Factors contributing to
shrinking size of middle class
– Disappearing opportunities for
those with little education
– Global competition and
advances in technology
– Growing dependence on
temporary workforce
– Rise of new growth industries
and nonunion workplaces
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Slide 12
Sociological Perspectives
on Stratification
█
Sociologists hotly debate
stratification and social inequality
and reach varying conclusions
No theorist stressed significance of class
for society more strongly than Karl Marx
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Slide 13
Karl Marx’s View of
Class Differentiation
█
Social relations depend on who
controls the primary mode of production
– Capitalism: Means of production held largely
in private hands and main incentive for
economic activity is accumulation of profits
– Bourgeoisie: Capitalist class;
owns the means of production
– Proletariat: Working class
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Slide 14
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 15
Max Weber’s View
of Stratification
█
No single characteristic totally
defines a person’s position
within the stratification system
– Class: Group of people who have
similar level of wealth and income
– Status group: People who
have the same prestige or lifestyle
– Power: Ability to exercise
one’s will over others
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Slide 16
Interactionist View
█
Veblen: those at top of social hierarchy
typically convert part of wealth into
conspicuous consumption:
purchase goods in order to flaunt their
superior wealth and social standing
– Conspicuous leisure
– Behavior judged to be typical of the lower
class subject to ridicule and legal action
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Slide 17
Is Stratification Universal?
█
Inequality exists in all societies
– Functionalist view: Social inequality necessary
so people motivated to fill important positions
Does not explain the wide disparity
between the rich and the poor
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Slide 18
Is Stratification Universal?
█
Conflict view: Human beings prone
to conflict over scarce resources
such as wealth, status, and power
– Stratification major source of societal tension
– Leads 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 19
Is Stratification Universal?
█
Lenski’s view: As a society advances
technologically, it becomes capable
of producing a surplus of goods
– Emergence of surplus resources
expands possibilities for inequality
– Allocation of surplus goods and
services reinforces social inequality
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Slide 20
Table 9-2: Sociological Perspectives on Social Stratification
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Slide 21
Stratification by Social Class
█
Objective Method
– Class largely viewed as a statistical category
•
•
•
•
Education
Occupation
Income
Place
of residence
Prestige: Respect and
admiration an occupation
holds in society
Esteem: Reputation a
specific person has
earned within
an occupation
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Slide 22
Measuring Social Class
█
Gender and Occupational Prestige
– For many years, social class studies tended
to neglect the occupations and incomes
of women as determinants of social rank
█
Multiple Measures
– Socioeconomic status (SES):
Measure of social class based on
income, education, and occupation
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 23
Table 9-2: Prestige Rankings of Occupations
Note: 100 is the highest and 0 the lowest possible prestige score.
Source: J. Davis et al. 2009. See also Nakao and Treas 1994.
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 24
Income and Wealth
█
Income in U.S. distributed unevenly
– During recession of 1999–2001, median
household wealth of Hispanic and
Black Americans fell 27% while white
households’ wealth grew 2 percent
– Wealth in the U.S. is much more
unevenly distributed than income
In 2009, half the population
controlled more than 97% of wealth
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Slide 25
Figure 9-4: Distribution of Wealth in the United States, 2001
Source: Data for 2009 in DeNavas-Walt et al.
2010:40; Bureau of the Census 2010d: Table H-3.
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 26
Research Today
█
9.1: Precarious Work
– Has the trend toward increasing reliance
on precarious work touched your family
or friends? Has anyone you know been
unemployed longer than six months?
– Looking forward to your own career,
can you think of a strategy for
avoiding precarious work, frequent job
loss, and long-term unemployment?
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 27
Poverty
█
█
Absolute poverty:
Level of subsistence that
no family should live below
Relative poverty:
Floating standard people
at the bottom of a society
are judged as being
disadvantaged
compared to others
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Slide 28
Who Are the Poor?
In 2009, about 36% of poor
working adults worked full-time,
compared to 65% of all adults
█ Feminization of poverty
█
– Since W. W. II, increasing proportion of
poor in U.S. have been women
Underclass: long-term poor
who lack training and skills
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Slide 29
Poverty
█
Not a static social class
– Gans: poverty and the poor satisfy positive
functions for many non-poor groups
•
•
•
•
•
Society’s dirty work performed at low cost
Creates jobs that serve the poor
Upholds conventional social norms
Guarantees higher status of more affluent
Absorb costs of social change
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Slide 30
Figure 9-4: Poverty in Selected Countries
Note: Data are averages for mid-2000s, as reported in 2009.
Poverty threshold is 50 percent of a nation’s median household income.
Source: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 2009a.
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 31
Table 9-3: Who are the Poor in the United States?
Source: Data for 2009, as reported by the Bureau of the Census; DeNavas-Walt et al. 2010:15.
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 32
Life Chances
█
Max Weber saw class as being closely
related to people’s life chances
– Life chances: Opportunities to
provide material goods, positive living
conditions, and favorable life experience
In times of danger, the affluent
have a better chance of surviving
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 33
Social Mobility
█
Social mobility: Movement of individuals
or groups from one position in a
society’s stratification system to another
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 34
Open Vs. Closed
Stratification Systems
█
█
Open system: Position
of each individual
influenced by the
person’s achieved status
Closed system: Allows little
or no possibility of moving up
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Slide 35
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 36
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 37
Figure 9-5: Intergenerational Income Mobility
Source: Mazumder 2008:10.
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Slide 38
Sociology on Campus
█
9.2: Social Class and Financial Aid
– How important is financial aid to you
and your friends? Without these
types of aid, would you be able
to cover your college expenses?
– Aside from a reduction in individual
social mobility, what might be the
long-term effects of the shortage
of need-based financial aid?
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 39
Executive Compensation
█
Looking at the Issue
– In 1965, top executives earned
24 times the average worker’s pay
– By 1980 the gap widened
to 40 times the average paycheck
– By 2009, the gap was
300 times the average
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 40
Executive Compensation
█
Applying Sociology
– Functionalist: compensation
reasonable given the potential for gain
– Conflict theorists: question compensation
and process that determine executives’ pay
– DiPrete: corporations report executives’
compensation relative to peer compensation
 Public comparisons of executive compensation
within industries may influence board decisions
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Slide 41
Executive Compensation
█
Initiating Policy
– Law now mandates companies publish
“summary compensation tables” with
retirement packages and “golden parachute”
– In 2009, White House appointed
Treasury Department official
to look into executive compensation
 Critics worry companies will just
develop new ways to inflate executives’ pay
© 2012 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.