sociology chapter 8

What percentage of Americans live in extreme poverty, meaning at near-starvation levels?

- 6.7 percent

The theory offered by Simon Kuznets regarding the relationship between inequality and economic development is challenged by which of the following facts?

- Between 1990 and 2004, CEO pay increased by 300 percent, while production worker pay increased by only 4.5 percent.

What is wealth?

- all of one's assets minus what one owes on them

What is relative poverty?

- poverty defined according to the living standards of the majority in any given society

What is status, according to Max Weber?

- the social honor or prestige a particular group is accorded by other members of a society

What is meant by the feminization of poverty?

-. an increase in the proportion of the poor who are female

According to your text, approximately what percentage of the country's total net worth was held by the bottom 60 percent of Americans in 2007?

-2%

Which of the following factors contribute significantly to homelessness? Select all that apply.

-: rising costs of housing, disability due to military service, closure of public mental health institutions

Rosie a woman from a working-class family who works as an administrative assistant, won a huge lottery jackpot. She decided to apply for membership at an exclusive country club in the next town over but felt unwelcome after ordering the "wrong" wine at a prospective member dinner and receiving stares from members when she smoked a cigarette outside. What does Rosie's experience demonstrate about class?

-Class is not only determined and expressed economically but also through lifestyle choices and personal tastes

A formula showing that inequality increases during the early stages of capitalist development, then declines, and eventually stabilizes at a relatively low level; advanced by the economist Simon Kuznets.

-Kuznets curve

The means whereby the production of material goods is carried on in a society, including not just technology but also the social relations between producers.

-means of production

working class

-mechanic

A social class composed broadly of those working in white-collar and lower managerial occupations.

-middle class

lower class

-migrant farm worker

Groups who suffer from negative status discrimination - they are looked down on by most other members of society. The Jews, for example, have been a pariah group throughout much of European history.

-pariah groups

An official government measure to define those living in poverty in the United States

-poverty line

Poverty defined according to the living standards of the majority in any given society.

-relative poverty

A form of social stratification in which some people are literally owned by others as their property.

-slavery

Movement of individuals or groups between different social positions.

-social mobility

The existence of structured inequalities between groups in society in terms of their access to material or symbolic rewards. While all societies involve some forms of stratification, only with the development of state-based systems did wide differences in wealth and power arise. The most distinctive form of stratification in modern societies is class divisions.

-social stratification

The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society. Status groups normally display distinct styles of life - patterns of behavior that the members of a group follow. Status privilege may be positive or negative. Pariah groups are regarded with disdain or treated as outcasts by the majority of the population.

-status

Mobility resulting from changes in the number and kinds of jobs available in a society.

-structural mobility

mobility resulting from changes in the number and kinds of jobs available in a society

-structural mobility

Social inequalities that result from patterns in the social structure.

-structured inequalities

The value of a worker's labor power, in Marxist theory, left over when an employer has repaid the cost of hiring the worker.

-surplus value

is directly challenged by the idea that structural forces shape the way resources are distributed.

-the culture of poverty thesis

Marx identified surplus value as the source of profit in a capitalist system. What is surplus value?

-the value of a worker's labor power left over when an employer has repaid the cost of hiring the worker

A class of individuals situated at the bottom of the class system, normally composed of people from ethnic minority backgrounds

-underclass

A social class broadly composed of the more affluent members of society, especially those who have -inherited wealth, own businesses, or hold large numbers of stocks (shares).

-upperclass

Money and material possessions held by an individual or group.

-wealth

A social class broadly composed of people working in blue-collar, or manual, occupations.

-working class

People who work but whose earnings are not enough to lift them above the poverty line

-working poor

Which of the following conditions allowed the accumulation of unprecedented wealth in the twenty-first century? Select all that apply.

globalization, the information revolution

In what way does Erik Olin Wright's theory of contradictory class locations modify Marx's theory of class? Select all that apply.

-Rather than seeing workers as one, undifferentiated class, Wright appreciates that there are significant differences between various members of the working class in terms of their relationship to both processes and means of production., Wright separated the means of production into physical means (land, factories, etc.) and non-physical means (labor relationships), recognizing that people might have control over some of the means of production and not others., Wright acknowledged that many workers possess certain skills and expertise that prevent their employees from reducing their wages to subsistence wages because they are far less replaceable than unskilled workers.

What is one implication of Bourdieu's theory of cultural capital?

-Social mobility is less about how hard you work and more about the kinds of tools you work with.

Which of the following statements could be concluded from this figure?

-The share of U.S. income going to the middle class has been slowly declining over the last 45 years.

What is the most significant difference between the working class and the lower class?

-While working-class families often struggle to get by, they tend to have significantly more job and neighborhood stability than those in the lower clas

The minimal requirements necessary to sustain a healthy existence

-absolute poverty

______have the highest percentage of median income, while____ have the lowest

-asians, blacks

People who own companies, land, or stocks (shares) and use these to generate economic returns

-capitalists

A social system in which one's social status is held for life

-caste

Although it is one of the most frequently used concepts in sociology, there is no clear agreement about how the notion should be defined. Most sociologists use the term to refer to socioeconomic variations between groups of individuals that create variations in their material prosperity and power.

-class

Ownership of wealth, occupation, income, and education are the four main bases of which kind of stratification system?

-class

According to Annette Lareau's research in Unequal Childhoods, what is the overall result of different parenting styles among working-class and middle-class families?

-class norms and values are reproduced from one generation to the next

Large-scale, interpersonal, and fluid systems of social hierarchy based on wealth, occupation, income, and education. (

-class systems

Positions in the class structure, particularly routine white-collar and lower managerial jobs, that share characteristics of the class positions both above and below them.

-contradictory class locations

According to the logic of Davis and Moore's functionalist theory of stratification, which of the following occupations must be functionally most important to society?

-corporate lawyer

The thesis, popularized by Oscar Lewis, that poverty is 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. The culture of poverty refers to the values, beliefs, lifestyles, habits, and traditions that are common among people living under conditions of material deprivation

-culture of poverty

A term popularized by Charles Murray to describe individuals who rely on state welfare provision rather than entering the labor market. The dependency culture is seen as the outcome of the "paternalistic" welfare state that undermines individual ambition and people's capacity for self-help

-dependency culture

negatively impacts women's class position far more than it impacts men's class position.

-divorce

What is one of the strongest predictors of income and wealth in later life?

-education

upper middle class

-engineer

The exchange of positions on the socioeconomic scale such that talented people move up the economic hierarchy while the less talented move down

-exchange mobility

the exchange of positions on the socioeconomic scale such that talented people move up the economic hierarchy while the less talented move down

-exchange mobility

An increase in the proportion of the poor who are female.

-feminization of poverty

lower middle class

-firefighter

According to the text, which of the following categories contribute to structured inequalities? Select all that apply.

-gender, racial identity

People who have no place to sleep and either stay in free shelters or sleep in public places not meant for habitation.

-homeless

Money received from paid wages and salaries or earned from investments.

-income

Payment, usually derived from wages, salaries, or investments

-income

Movement up or down a social stratification hierarchy from one generation to another.

-intergenerational mobility

movement up or down a social stratification hierarchy from one generation to another

-intergenerational mobility

Movement up or down a social stratification hierarchy within the course of a personal career

-intragenerational mobility

movement up or down a social stratification hierarchy within the course of a personal career

-intragenerational mobility

A social class comprised of those who work part time or not at all and whose household income is typically lower than $30,000 a year.

-lower class