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Essay on equality of opportunity
Essays on people living in poverty
Reflections on poverty
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Poor People & Economic Injustice Economic inequality and injustice come in the same hand. Poor people are more likely to experience inequality and injustice. The negative assumptions of poor people are created by the media and politicians. Promoting economic justice by offering people living in poverty some form of social support. Barbara Ehrenreich found in her experiment the workforce for low-wage was difficult. Conley talks about the different types of social inequalities and how they have been unsuccessful. People living in poverty choose to stay is a popular assumption of poor people. Another stereotype of why people are poor is that they are lazy. Every person in the United States has an equal opportunity to succeed and poor people choose …show more content…
She sets out to explore the world that welfare mothers are entered. The point was not so much to become poor as to get a sense of the spectrum of low-wage work that existed-from waitressing to housekeeping. She felt mistreated when it was announced that there has been a report on “drug activity”, as a result, the new employees will be required to be tested, as will the current employees on a random basis. She explained feeling mistreated, “I haven 't been treated this way-lined up in the corridor, threatened with locker searches, peppered with carelessly aimed accusations-since junior high school” (Ehrenreich,286). The other problem is that this job shows no sign of being financially viable. Ehrenreich states that there is no secret economies that nourish the poor, “If you can 't put up the two months’ rent you need to secure an apartment, you end up paying through the nose for a room by the week” (286). On the first day of housekeeping, she is yelled and given nineteen rooms to clean. For four hours without a break she striped and remake the beds. At the end of the experience she explained that she couldn 't hold two jobs and couldn 't make enough money to live on with one as where single mothers with children. She has clarified that she has advantages compare to the long-term …show more content…
The first standard of equality is ontological equality which is the notion that everyone is created equal at birth. Ontological equality often justifies material inequality. In fact, this type of equality is sometimes used to put forth the notion that poverty is a virtue. A second standard of equality is equality of opportunity meaning that “everyone has an equal chance to achieve wealth, social prestige, and power because the rules of the game, so to speak, are the same for everyone”( Conley, 247). Therefore, any existing inequality is fair as long as everyone plays by the rules. The standard of equality is equality of condition, which is the idea that everyone should have an equal starting point. The last form of equality is equality of outcome which states, everyone should end up with the same outcome regardless of
...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.
The author Barbara Ehrenreich is a journalist, who decided to write an article on how it was to live on minimum wage. She stopped her life and began a series of trips across country to gain information for her article, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America.
According to a 1997 report of the National Coalition for the Homeless, “nearly one-fifth of all homeless people are employed in full or part-time jobs”. In the book Nickel and Dimed, On Not Getting by in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich, the author goes undercover in order to investigate and experience first-hand how life is for America’s “working poor”. The “working poor” are defined as individuals who have a full-time job, sometimes more than one, but still cannot afford the basics of shelter, food and adequate healthcare. As one can imagine, this led to many public health concerns. In each of the three locations visited, Ehrenreich realizes that for many, “getting by” in America can sometimes be a daunting task.
She knows she will never truly experience poverty because this is nothing more than a project but she leaves behind her old life and becomes known as a divorced homemaker reentering the workforce after many years. Her main goal is to get enough income to be able to pay for all her expenses and have enough money to pay next months rent.
Throughout her chapter, Ehrenreich maintains a degrading tone on low income workers. She explains how "Work is what you do for others."
In The Working Poor: Invisible in America, David K. Shipler tells the story of a handful of people he has interviewed and followed through their struggles with poverty over the course of six years. David Shipler is an accomplished writer and consultant on social issues. His knowledge, experience, and extensive field work is authoritative and trustworthy. Shipler describes a vicious cycle of low paying jobs, health issues, abuse, addiction, and other factors that all combine to create a mountain of adversity that is virtually impossible to overcome. The American dream and promise of prosperity through hard work fails to deliver to the 35 million people in America who make up the working poor. Since there is neither one problem nor one solution to poverty, Shipler connects all of the issues together to show how they escalate each other. Poor children are abused, drugs and gangs run rampant in the poor neighborhoods, low wage dead end jobs, immigrants are exploited, high interest loans and credit cards entice people in times of crisis and unhealthy diets and lack of health care cause a multitude of problems. The only way that we can begin to see positive change is through a community approach joining the poverty stricken individuals, community, businesses, and government to band together to make a commitment to improve all areas that need help.
Patricia Hyjer Dyk talks about poverty and how it complicates the family life. On the other hand, Stephanie Coontz focuses on how families have changed from the 20th century to the 21st century; focusing on the negative and positive aspects of both. Dyke doesn’t talk much about how the family system and the earning system has changed, while Coontz focuses on that; however, in both the authors’ articles, women and their role in the society are significantly covered.
During the industrializing era in the United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century, unskilled laborers and skilled blue-collar men struggled to even put food on their tables; the emerging middle class struggled greatly as well, but had little trouble feeding themselves in this time period. It was the wealthy elite who prospered in this period, dining and living lavishly. Labor leaders and reformers tried to used many tactics to persuade prosperous Americans to concern themselves with the issues of the day; the main tactic used was the manipulation of emotion to get others to join the reformers’ cause. This trend was part of a greater global pattern of economic insecurity in the United States, which only heightened during the Great Depression in the decades to come.
Ensuring equality among the people promotes fairness and reduces conflict and jealousy. By treating everyone equally we maintain our respect and are able to work together better. The rule we create treats everyone the same and does not provide any special treatment to any specific person. As long as everyone does what is required of them they will obtain what is rightfully due to them.
Social inequality is a situation in which you can find differences between individual groups in a society from the perspective of their social groups, social clubs or social status. In some parts of the world, there are different social groups that have the same property rights, voting rights, freedom of expression, health and education. Research shows that inequalities persist ...
The objective of this essay is to illuminate my overall reaction to the reading of “The Working Poor” conveying what I do not like while highlighting a sociological perspective, in addition to explaining if the reading is applicable to my own life experience. Taking notice, the subject at hand was very sobering alluding even if we ourselves have not been partakers of living in the obscurity of prosperity between poverty and wellbeing, certainly we have encountered someone that has become a victim to it. With this in mind, my reaction is there are countless victims of poverty; surely one does not have to go very far to find them as we understand them to be the working class. There are those that may express the thought of having a job is a means of not only taking care of everyday natural needs, but it should produce the opportunity to rise above status quo or improve one’s condition, thus we see the Functionalist perspective applied.
In The Working Poor, David Shipler talks about how beliefs and fears are a barrier to those connected in the world of poverty due to the choices individuals make and the outcomes that follow. Those in poverty miss out on great opportunities due to the overwhelming fear of being judged. Whether individuals come from a criminal record, bad neighborhood, or lack experience, they never push themselves for better because they fear rejection. Although Shipler believes that society can help those in poverty and empower them to achieve greatness, the problem can only be solved once they overcome their own fear that is usually caused by low self-esteem and take accountability for their own actions.
Economics plays a large role into inequality. Those in cities who are in the lowest income percentile suffer the most inequality. This is due to the fact that they can not afford the same commodities as those who earn more. This can be seen in any city. The people in the suburbs are very wealthy compared to those in the inner city or ghetto. And this is due to economic inequality. According to Faiza Shaheen, the way to solve economic inequality is to have fairer taxes, jobs that lead into careers, and polarized pay (Economic Inequality
Inequality is presents in many communities and there some consequences attach with it. One of the reasons for inequality is income. Stone (2012) states the consequences of inequality in communities, especially when talking about income of individuals that are part of the community, “income inequality seems also to increases racial prejudice and discrimination against women and ethnic minorities,” (p. 59). Low-income individuals are forced to accept what the services provided by the government, even if those individuals who do want them. Stone (2012) give an example of the lack of choices low income individuals, when talking about food, “very poor people live under constant threat of starvation or homelessness and don’t experience most of their
Economic inequality is ingrained in our society. Because of this fact, many would argue that “that’s just how it is,” but in reality this is not how a community is suppose to function. As Michael Sandel writes in his book Justice, “As inequality deepens, rich and poor live increasingly separate lives.” Sandel makes an excellent point. As economic divisions, such as the ones present in the United States, worsen, the classes diverge on every level. Wealthy people attend different schools, purchase luxury cars, and live in gated communities. Meanwhile, the poor live in squalor, use public transportation, and attend failing schools. Aside from the lack of a quality education making it harder to escape poverty, the poor are from birth at a disadvantage to those on the other side of the economic scale. The United States is not a land of guaranteed equality of result, that is...