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The gap between rich and poor in America
Uneven wealth distribution in america
Uneven wealth distribution in america
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This book written by Melvin L. Oliver and Thomas M. Shapiro, addresses the following question: What will an examination of the black middle class, compared to the white middle class, reveal, in terms of economic stability and distribution of wealth? The authors answer this question in seven chapters. Using different studies, statistics, and history, this book conducts a socioeconomic comparison of the two races in America. The book begins with the history of blacks in America during the period of reconstruction after the Civil War. It states that blacks went directly from being slaves, to being freedmen without reparations. They were entering American society with little money and no material assets, this set a foundation of inequality and uneven distribution of wealth between the races from the beginning. This …show more content…
The black middle class is far behind the white middle class in terms of properties and assets that can create more opportunities for their given groups and for generations to come. Oliver and Shapiro put emphasis on statistics that portray gaps between the black middle class and white middle class. They argue that wealth in America is unevenly distributed, unfair, and in favor of whites. Black Wealth/ White Wealth gives us important information about the causes of American racial inequality. They prove that institutionalized racism through government policies helped increase wealth for whites over blacks, at the same time discrimination towards black people kept them from gaining wealth. They include a variety of studies conducted by other sociologists to show evidence for their main argument, for example a previous study shows that black households earn less than two thirds as much of the average white household, and that an average black person possesses eight to nineteen dollars for every one hundred dollars whites
It shows that Negros were able to purchase their freedom and purchase the freedom of their family members. It shows a sense of equality in the way that free blacks could go to court and potentially win cases against white farmers. Free blacks owning slaves and indentured servants, some of which were white, could also be seen as equality. It also shows how free blacks had a thought of a future in the way that they drew up wills in which their family members were granted land and livestock. Knowing that white farming landowners and free blacks lived together in a sense of harmony goes back to the main theme of Myne Owne Ground. It shows that slavery is indeed an embarrassment to our nation. Knowing that blacks and whites were able to live together, trade, and be civil towards each other shows that slavery was unfounded and not
The first part of this book looks into African American political activity during the pre-Civil War and Civil War periods. He uses this part of the book to show that blacks, even while in slavery, used their position to gain rights from their slaveholders. These rights included the right to farm their own plots, sale of their produce, and to visit neighboring plantations. This was also the period
One of the most critical observations about the state of our sociological health is observed by MacGillis of the Atlantic’s article entitled “The Original Underclass”. That is that the social breakdown of low-income whites began to reflect trends that African American’s were primary subjects of decades ago such as unemployment, and drug addiction.
William Julius Wilson creates a thrilling new systematic framework to three politically tense social problems: “the plight of low-skilled black males, the persistence of the inner-city ghetto, and the fragmentation of the African American family” (Wilson, 36). Though the conversation of racial inequality is classically divided. Wilson challenges the relationship between institutional and cultural factors as reasons of the racial forces, which are inseparably linked, but public policy can only change the racial status quo by reforming the institutions that support it.
...ty and their survival as a group in society because of restraint from the federal government in the ability to litigate their plight in Court. The Author transitions the past and present signatures of Jim Crow and the New Jim Crow with the suggestion that the New Jim Crow, by mass incarceration and racism as a whole, is marginalizes and relegates Blacks to residential, educational and constitutionally endowed service to Country.
While the formal abolition of slavery, on the 6th of December 1865 freed black Americans from their slave labour, they were still unequal to and discriminated by white Americans for the next century. This ‘freedom’, meant that black Americans ‘felt like a bird out of a cage’ , but this freedom from slavery did not equate to their complete liberty, rather they were kept in destitute through their economic, social, and political state.
This story was set in the deep south were ownership of African Americans was no different than owning a mule. Demonstrates of how the Thirteenth Amendment was intended to free slaves and describes the abolitionist’s efforts. The freedom of African Americans was less a humanitarian act than an economic one. There was a battle between the North and South freed slaves from bondage but at a certain cost. While a few good men prophesied the African Americans were created equal by God’s hands, the movement to free African Americans gained momentum spirited by economic and technological innovations such as the export, import, railroad, finance, and the North’s desire for more caucasian immigrants to join America’s workforce to improve our evolving nation. The inspiration for world power that freed slaves and gave them initial victory of a vote with passage of the Fifteenth Amendment. A huge part of this story follows the evolution of the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment more acts for civil rights.
In her book, Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life, Annette Lareau argues out that the influences of social class, as well as, race result in unequal childhoods (Lareau 1). However, one could query the inequality of childhood. To understand this, it is necessary to infer from the book and assess the manner in which race and social class tend to shape the life of a family. As the scholar demonstrates, each race and social class usually has its own unique way of child upbringing based on circumstances. To affirm this, the different examples that the scholar presents in the book could be used. Foremost, citing the case of both the White and the African American families, the scholar advances that the broader economics of racial inequality has continued to hamper the educational advancement and blocks access to high-paying jobs with regard to the Blacks as opposed to the Whites. Other researchers have affirmed this where they indicate that the rate of unemployment among the African Americans is twice that of the White Americans. Research further advances that, in contrast to the Whites, for those African Americans who are employed, there is usually a greater chance that they have been underemployed, receive lower wages, as well as, inconsistent employment. This is how the case of unequal childhood based on race comes about; children from the Black families will continue residing in poverty as opposed to those from the white families.
In the book, he describes the history of the Colonial era and how slavery began. He shows us how the eighteenth century progressed and how American slavery developed. Then it moves onto the American Revolution, and how the American slaves were born into class. It was this time that the slave population was more than twice what it had been. The Revolutionary War had a major impact on slavery and on the slaves.
For decades since the arrival of African people to America, they had been treated as no more than as material resources and had been oppressed by white society. During their slavery they were to work until death and could not learn to read or write. The author of the Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois, described the struggles of newly freed slaves and the current view of society. Once blacks became free it seemed like they were worse off than when they were slaves. Now they were responsible for their own income, work, family, and lives. White society still did not let them prosper like a white man could, they were put into a system in which they were to abide by the rules of white society, a sort of semi-slavery as Du Bois described. Now trapped
Society associates middle-class blacks as equal to middle-class whites because of their class position, but the inequality is
In the video, Race: The Power of Allusion, “At one point we had explicit laws that says whites are on top, and Blacks are on the bottom. Today, we have many of the same practices without the explicit language...” (Race:The Power of Allusion). One of these specific practices is the Housing segregation that occurs between black and whites. According to Race: The Power of Allusion “As homes in white communities appreciated in value, the net worth of these white families grew. For most non-white families who stayed in urban neighborhoods, the housing market open to them in the 50 's and 60 's was largely a rental market. You don 't gain equity by paying rent.” It is later explained how equity is what determines your wealth. If non-white people are not given chances to build up equity, their wealth is much less than that of a white person. In addition, although this information is from the 1950’s and 60’s, it is still relevant because of what is being inherited from generation to generation. Since non-white people are starting off with less equity, their future offspring will have the same issue. This is just one of the many ways non-white people are continued to be indirectly discriminated against. Once you graduate from college, or further in the future
We still a large gap between the distribution of wealth between white homes and homes belonging to people of color. Residential segregation in neighborhood exists as a direct result of these polices. Large gaps in education and wage earnings between white Americans a non-white Americans are still largely prevalent. When we connect the injustice of the people of color experienced in the past with the injustices the still play today it becomes more than just a mere
In the United States the land of equal opportunity one might be surprised to find a great deal of economic disparity. Research on the topic was not extensive until a rise in economic disparities over the past thirty years grabbed researcher’s attention. This research would reveal that economic inequality was not just some random conclusion, but legitimate cause and patterns of these causes could be traced It would also uncover the consequences economic inequality had on social and political life. Research not only focused on economic inequality in America but also globally, researchers have also greatly expanded on literature concerning economic disparities with hope of raising the consciousness of the people and penetrating the heart of the social problem of economic inequality that many are faced with (Neckerman, Torche 2007). Economic inequality has been on the rise in America for more than two decades. This socially divisive trend emerged from the sluggish economy of the 1970s and continued through the booming 1980s, when surging tides clearly failed to lift all ships. Instead, escalating inequality in both individual earnings and family income widened the gulf between rich and poor and led to the much-publicized decline of the middle class (Gottschalk, P. (1993). I believe economic disparity is a social problem simply because of the definition of economic inequality which is self-explanatory when things are unequal this almost always leads to negative consequences and things seem to be unfair. Those that fall on the downside of the inequality are more likely to be face with poor housing, conditions, poor healthcare, and most importantly the will be faced with poor educational opportunity ...
For example, according to the Washington Post, 31 percent of Millennials rate blacks as lazier than whites and 23 percent of Millennials think blacks less intelligent than whites. In other statistics written in sight of black voice, it says that blacks and Hispanics still live in poorer neighborhoods than whites with working class incomes. In addition, there is a big gap in wealth between white Americans and non-white Americans. As shown in statistics, with comparable income, average neighborhood poverty is different for race. In poor households (income below $40,000), gap was bigger than middle-income households and affluent households. Especially, 21.8% black non-Hispanic has poverty following Hispanic, Asian and White. The other graph shows that the racial wealth gap was wider than about 20 years ago. In 1984, the gap is $85,070 between African American families and white families, but in 2009, the gap between two countries is $236,500. From these statistics, in America, discrimination to Black is severe.