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Social inequality by conflict theorists
Role of social justice in a society
Social inequality by conflict theorists
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As a sociologist we look at two different perspectives, there is structural functional perspective and the conflict perspective. Out of the two perspectives I agree with the conflict perspective more than I do the structural functional perspective, and I’m going to use this perspective throughout my paper. I choose this perspective because as much as we want society to be “fair” and it work smoothly, it just doesn’t. We have struggle for power and I believe there are the groups that are powerful and wealthy, and there are some groups that are the working class and struggle to make it. I also picked this perspective because in the book Nickel and Dimed, Ehrenreich gave up the power and wealth to struggle with the working class to show us how truly difficult it sometimes can be. My interview was with a girl in her late 20’s that worked a part time job at a retail store called T.J. Maxx. My interview agrees with Ehrenreich’s conclusions 100 percent. She moved here from another state to live with …show more content…
We are all putting money into a pot, and some of us aren’t using the money or the resources that we end up helping out. There are a lot of programs that are out there to help support lower waged workers or people that can’t find jobs. Some of these programs are food stamps, medicare, and lower income housing. Everyone helps pay for these things, but there are only a certain amount of people that can use them. If you make a certain amount of money and it is too high, then you don’t qualify for them, even though maybe it isn’t high enough to live comfortably. Retirement may not come as easy for the younger generation because of the fact that people are using the social security, and we may not have the amount that we need when we retire. How our society is set up, you almost get more taken away the harder you work, and for the ones that don’t make as much, get all of the
Nickel And Dimed: Occupations Barbara Ehrenreich provides evidence in “Nickel and Dimed” that she’s an outstanding author with this book. Its engaging and compelling, no question about that. But it’s hard to get from side to side at times since of the authors attitudes. Her key summit is to carry concentration to the scrape of the working deprived, but she manages to be both abusive and divisive. Occupation on attacking our industrialist system, she fails to become aware of that the endurance of upper classes seems to be what motivates the poor, fairly than what dispirits them. She blames capitalism for the injustices of the world, slightly than easy bad management techniques. A company should be shown that would benefit from a union and it will be shown to all around that one that will promote even better from decent, gentle management decisions. Most irritating, she’s constantly negative about the whole lot, even the positive experiences she has. When one of her colleagues offers to allow her move in with her and her family, not only does Ehrenreich turn the propose down, but she still describes it sneeringly as a "touched by an angel moment." Does she have to dribble with irony yet when writing about an authentically type deed? She condemns "visible Christians," any and all organization, yuppies, anybody who hires and consequently exploits maids, welfare reform, and still tosses in a prod at people who study John Grisham. Is there someone she likes? Her logic is troublesome as well. She begins her research to see if the functioning poor have some financial endurance tactics that the center class don’t know regarding, and decides at the conclusion that no, they don’t, as if admitting that this would signify the poor are imp...
She decides if she could earn $7 an hour, then she could afford $500 rent. She found a place to rent 45 minutes away from work. In order to deal with the financial responsibilities, Ehrenreich took to the streets in search for another unskilled job since she did not want to use her car as a place of residence. She continues her experiment in a new environment which took her to Maine since the area is mostly a Caucasian community. When she realized that Portland was just another $6-$7 an hour town, she picked up two jobs to be practical. She began her quest for lodging at Motel 6. After several disappointments searching for a place to lie; she found a cottage for $120 a week and determined to poor cannot compete with the rich in the housing market. Ehrenreich moved to Minnesota to finish her experiment, where she hoped there would be a satisfying harmony between rent and wages. She locates an apartment from a friend lasting a short period until she finds a place to stay on her own. She found housing to be a struggle as there seems to be a shortage of houses; as a result she transitioned herself into a hotel. Her stay at the hotel proved to surpass her estimated expenses despite the fact this was her only safe
...Even with the pitfalls in Ehrenreich's research, she managed to shine a light on the everyday plight of the low wage worker. She achieved employment at several different low wage service jobs and she also achieved friendliness with the coworkers there. Unfortunately, she could not achieve her goal of making enough money to pay the following month's rent at her accommodations, as she dictated to be her sign of success at the beginning of the project. Without this success, she can truly say that the plight of the low wage worker and the women leaving welfare is an extremely difficult one with great hardship and lack of fulfillment as these participants of the lower class work day to day to keep their chins up and make do with what, even if little, they have.
While serving as a waitress, Ehrenriech learned about many different people. Some of these co-workers were immigrants who had recently come to this country. “I learn that he [George] is not paid by Jerry’s but the ‘agent’ who shipped him over--$5 an hour, with the agent getting the dollar or so difference between that and what Jerry’s pays for dishwashers”(38). Their contracts lacked any benefits, and they were paid below minimum wage. People, like George, cannot read their contracts before they sign because they don’t understand the language.
The conflict perspective/theory involves how “the elite class…. use social control mechanisms …. to perpetuate their own advantageous positions in society.” (p.109). Further they can gain an “unequal access to economical goods …. resulting [in gaining capital versus someone poorer who would
In Barbara Ehrenreich’s book “Nickel and Dimed” a social experiment of the greatest magnitude is taken underway. The journalist is Ehrenreich herself and the experiment was about a woman, who was recently removed from welfare, would survive on a six to seven dollar hourly wage. In addition to this experiment, Ehrenreich promised herself that she would never use her college degree to land a job, always take the highest paying job if offered to her, and find the cheapest living conditions to accommodate herself with. While immersed in her ‘experiment’ Ehrenreich ends up travelling to Florida, Maine, and Minnesota looking for jobs and places to live on a minimum wage salary. Ultimately
Year’s ago, mention of this widening gap between the privileged and the struggling was considered “Marxist”, but now the facts are too evident to be blamed on a belief. The richer continue to get richer and the poorer get poorer; due to the fact that, the wealthy pay the labor working majority unfair wages. Ironically, this “supreme” group makes their fortune because of these under paid people. For example, Walmart a low paying corporation owned by the wealthiest family in America. As previously stated, the success of the upper class is at the expense of the lower class and we see this in more ways then one: late fees and rates are collected by the rich, Realestate is bought up by them, and they have control of politics. The solution seen most fit by Ehrenreich and Lowenstein would be to remove the classes and have an egalitarian
Poverty and low wages have been a problem ever since money became the only thing that people began to care about. In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich, she presents the question, “How does anyone live on the wages available to the unskilled?” This question is what started her experiment of living like a low wage worker in America. Ehrenreich ends up going to Key West, Portland, and Minneapolis to see how low wage work was dealt with in different states. With this experiment she developed her main argument which was that people working at low wages can’t live life in comfort because of how little they make monthly and that the economic system is to blame.
The rapid development of global economy with the opening of new markets worldwide gave way to the development of new means of production and also to the change of ideologies across the world. Alongside with that, the division between different groups or classes within societies became more apparent as some people got richer and other poorer. These two phenomena, the worldwide development of industries and consequent class struggles, have been analyzed by two major thinkers of their times, Karl Marx and Robert Reich. Their essays have been influential and are similar in sense that they analyze existing conditions of societies and give projections on future fates of people, or more specifically, fates of classes. In this paper, the main focus will be on the fate of the wealthiest people; these are the bourgeois for Marx and symbolic analysts for Reich. More specifically, it will be argued that the rich people will be in the worst position according to Marx and this position will cover two aspects: material aspect, which is how well the rich will eventually manage their properties, and the inherent antagonism of classes and its consequences for the wealthy.
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, published in 2001 by Barbara Ehrenreich, is a book about an author who goes undercover and examines lives of the working lower class by living and working in similar conditions. Ehrenreich sets out to learn how people survive off of minimum wage. For her experiment, she applies rules including that she cannot use skills acquired from her education or work during her job search. She also must take the highest-paying job offered to her and try her best to keep it. For her search of a home, she has to take the cheapest she can find. For the experiment, Ehrenreich took on low-wage jobs in three cities: in Florida, Maine, and Minnesota.
Clark and Lipset (1991) explain that looking at class theories that has been a lot of change in class and it has altered the concept of class toward the fragmentation of stratification. Clark and Lipset (1991) further explains that changes have occurred since Marx and Weber write their view on social stratification and it went into high gear since 1970s. Clark and Lipset (1991) acknowledge a change for the theories of stratification is that traditional hierarchies is declining and economic and family hierarchies is less than generation or two ago. Clark and Lipset (1991) explains that class conflict declines, there would be less conflict or organized lines, for instance gender. However, not all hierarchies are generating counter-reactions and there is an acceptance of democratic process to allow the opposition to surface. According Clark and Lipset (1991), “the key trends could be described as one of fragmentation of stratification: the weakening of class stratification, especially as shown in distinct class-differentiated lifestyle, the decline of economic determinism, and the increased importance of social and cultural factors, politics is less organized by class and more by other loyalties, the slimming of the family and social mobility is less family-determined, more ability and education
Looking at this from the different perspectives of a functionalist, symbolic interactionist, and conflict helps to show other points of view. If you were to look at this book from a functionalist’s perspective you would be looking at it from an extremely greedy aspect. A functionalist would say that their parents and society told them that only people with money were good and successful. Thus, causing you to feel like “trash” or class if you did not make a huge salary, and live a wealthy life. A symbolic interactionist would tell you that they grew up where all of their peers drove nice cars, and had large homes, so to fit in, you need to be able to buy those things. However, a person with a conflict point of view would say that it was her ongoing struggle with society, and having to defend her class, that has made her who she is today.
There is a problem in the United States that is growing and is causing issues in our country, but not everybody knows about it. The problem is the distribution of wealth in our society and the world as a whole, and how it is getting worse. Some people would say that it is an inequality due to the needs of the society, while others would say it is to the needs or individuals. This causes even more problems because of there being more than one supposed reason for the issue at hand. The problem is that the distribution of power is possibly starting to be lopsided, and for many reasons. There are two main views of why this is happening, the functionalist perspective and the conflict perspective, and they differ in many ways on what is wrong, why it is wrong and what to do about it.
The Me, Me, Me Generation is a generation that feels as though they do not have to do anything. Their idea of “at least I showed up” is one that affects our government dramatically. Therefore, many people are on welfare because they are unemployed, dropouts that cannot find a job. Welfare should be for the people who are unemployed because of a major injury, that cannot find a job, and cannot support themselves or their family.
Ø In particular with Durkheim’s work, it is too optimistic and maintains the idea of social solidarity as the main theme, and simply believes pathologies can be solved through simple social reform, ignoring any problems or conflict and the affects. Ø Marxists argue that the modern family is organised to support and benefit the ruling class and the capitalist economy, rather than benefiting all of society. In particular, they accuse functionalists for ignoring the fact that power is not equally distributed in society. Some groups have more wealth and power than others and may be able to impose their norms and values as less powerful groups.