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16 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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Status Consistency
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When a person has a similar rank on all three dimensions of socioal class: prpery, prestige, and power
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Status Inconsistency
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When someone has a mixture of high and low ranks
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Exchange Mobility
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When large numbers of people move up and down the social class ladder, but on balance, the proportions of the social classes remain about the same. Fort example, if a million or so workers are trained in some new technology and they move up the social ladder.
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Reserve labor Force
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Welfare's prupose is not to help people, but rather, to maintain a reserve labor force. It is desgned to keep the unemployed alive during economic downturns until they are needed during the next economic boom.
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Intergenerational Mobility
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Change that occurs between generations when grown up children end up on a different rung of the social class ladder than the one occupied by their parents.
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Downward Mobility
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Moving down on the social class ladder. For example, if your parents are owners of a car dealership and you end up dropping out of college and selling cars.
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Upward Mobility
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Up on the social class ladder. For example, if the son of a man who sells cars graduates from college and buys a Saturn dealership.
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Social Class Ladder
(Gilbert and Kahl's) |
Social Class: Capitalist
Education: Prestigious University Occupation: Investors, top executives Income: $1 million or more % Population: 1% Social Class: Upper Middle Education: College with Postgrad Study occupation: Professionals, upper managers Income: $125,000 + % Population: 15% Social Class: Lower Middle Education: Highschool or college, often apprenticeship Occupation: Semi-professional, lower managers, crafts people income: $60,000 % Population: 34% Social Class: Working Education: Highschool Occupation: Low paid retail, factory worker, clerical worker, sales Income: $35,000 % population: 30% Social Class: working poor Education: Some highschool Occupation: Laborers, service worker, low paid sales Income: $17,000 Percent Population: 16% Social Class: Underclass Education: Some Highschol Occupation: Unemployed, and part-time on welfare Income: under $10,000 % Population: 4% |
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Structural Explanation of Poverty
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features of society deny some people access to education or learning job skills. They emphasize racial ethnic, age,and gender discrimination, as wella s changes in the job market- closing of plants, elimination of unskilled jobs, increase in marginal jobs that pay poverty wages. Some people find their escape routes to a better like blocked.
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Prestige
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Respect of regard. It is linked to occupational status. Globally occupations that bring greater prestige are those that pay more, require more education, and abstract thought, and offer more independence.
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Power Elite
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Refer to those who make the big decisions in the US society. This elite wields extraordinary power in the US society. No major decision of the US government is made without this elite's approval
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Power
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Ability to carry out your will despite resistence
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Culture of Poverty
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Poor tend to get trapped in a culture of poverty. People assuem that the values and behaviors of the poor "make them fundamentally different from other Americas, and that these factors are largely responsible for their continued long term poverty." People think that the poor are lazy people who bring poverty on themselves.
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Horatio Alger Myth
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Belief that anyone can get ahead if only they tried hard enough; it encourages people to strive to get ahead. It also deflects blame for failure from society to the individual. Belief that most Americans, including minorities and the working poor, have an average or better than average chance of getting ahead. (obviously statistical impossibility)
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Invdividual Explanation of Poverty
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Sociologists reject individualistic explanations such as laziness and lack of intelligence, calling tem worthless stereotypes. they reluctantly acknowledge droppiong out of schol, bearing children in teen years, averaging more children than women in other social classes.
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Myths about the poor
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1. Most poor people are lazy. They are poor because they do not want to work.
2. Poor people are trapped in a cycle of poverty that few escape 3. Most of the poor are African Americans and Latinos 4. Most of the poor are single mothers and their children 5. Most of the poro live in the inner city 6. The poor live on welfare |
