Social Class, Inequality, Poverty

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Social Class

Social Class: generally defined of a group of individuals who share a similar socio-economic position based on income, occupation, etc.

-Income: the amount of money you earn from jobs or investments

-Wealth: total amount of money you have

Sources: savings, investments, and inheritance

Dennis Gilbert's Model of Class Structure: shows variables that effect social classes

Ascribed Status: a position you're born into or that you take on involuntarily in you life

Has more of an effect later in life bc it affects what achieved status's you take

Achieved Status: a position you gain through your achievements, abilities, or efforts

Social Mobility: the predominant belief that upward social mobility is the norm; current research indicates that the American Dream (not many people obtain it) is a fading reality for many individuals

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Inequality

The growing gap between the poor/ rich: the income and wealth gap between the most privileged classes and the rest of the population has been growing for nearly 40 years

Racial Wealth Gap: the rich and the poor is even more pronounced when race is added to the mix; the average White family has accumulated much more wealth than Black and Hispanic families

Gender: men make significantly more than women when they attain the same level of education

Race: Blacks and Hispanics almost always makes less than Whites and Asians, even when they have the same level of education

Global Inequality: nothing compares to the amount of inequality that exists globally (United States is much better off than most countries)

EX: 8 richest men have the same amount of wealth as the bottom 50% of the world's population

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Poverty

Number in Poverty and Poverty Rates: poverty line established how much a family of 4 can live off of

Characteristics of the Poverty Population:

-Household Type: single families headed by a mother are more likely to be poor

-Education: high rate of poverty when an adult doesn't finish high school

-Paid Work

-Disability Status

-Race: 2x higher for Blacks, Hispanics, & Native Americans

-Region: south has highest poverty; Northeast has lowest

-Concentrated Neighborhood Poverty: 40% of neighborhood is poor; black people are more likely to live in poor areas

-Child Poverty: 11.9 million children lived in poverty

Working Poor:

-includes 10.5 million people

-more women than men are considered working poor

-Blacks/ Hispanics are more than twice as likely as Whites/ Asians

Homelessness: total of number of homelessness in America has gone down; 1 of 5 are children

-Factors: unaffordable housing (spend most money on shelter)

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