Chapter 9: Social Stratification

The division of society into categories is called social stratification. Almost every society in history has divided it’s members into categories depending on their characteristics.Social stratification divides people into groups depending on their status, ethnicity and physical characteristics. During social stratification groups of people are made and called systems and classes. Many factors influence your class. Social stratification usually also involves a certain level and people that live in poverty, the standard of living that is below the minimum level considered adequate by society.

A system of social stratification is the caste system, a system where scarce resources and social rewards are distributed on the basis of ascribed resources. In this system you will have for all your life what you are born with. Exogamy, the marriage outside of one’s own social category, instead, they practice endogamy, where you are only allowed to marry someone from your own social category. There also exists the class system, here, the distribution of scarce resources and rewards are determined on the basis of achieved statuses.

Factors that influence social stratification are social class, this is the grouping of people with similar levels of wealth, power and prestige. Wealth is the addition of the persons assets (the value of everything that person owns) and his income (money earned through salaries etc…). Power is the ability to control the behavior of others, with or without their consent. Prestige is the respect, honor, recognition, or courtesy an individual receives from other members of society. Sociologists have come up with the term socioeconomic status, this is a rating that combines social factors such as educational level, occupational prestige, and places of residence with the economic factor of income.

We can see the different social classes since many years before and still we see it now.

Poverty is a very big issue in most countries today. In many countries, the minimum income a person can earn is called poverty level. 35% of people that live in poverty are children less than 18 years, about 57% of people that live in poverty are women, 22% of African Americans live under poverty level standards, being the minority with biggest poverty level, and of these 22%, 30% are kids with less than 18 years. That is how shocking poverty levels are today in America. Poverty is an issue we should be concerned of with no doubt, it has many effects on people. Poverty affects peoples life chances, the likelihood that individuals have of sharing in the opportunities and benefits of society. For example, health, length of life, housing, and education. People that live in poverty also tend to have shorter life expectancies than people than other members of society. Life expectancy is the average number of years that a person born a specific year is estimated to live. Fortunately the government is doing its job and is trying to fight poverty, which we can see has devastating effects.

History has taught us how no matter how hard we try to create a society where everyone is equal, bringing ideas such as communism, even though sounds very good, is practically impossible. Functionalists and Conflict perspective sociologists have many theories to why society is the way it is and why social stratification is unavoidable, and probably even necessary. But after all, we can’t do much to stop it, just to deal with the biggest problem of social stratification, which is that it makes poverty just as unavoidable as social stratification itself.