Social Class and Social Stratification

A type of poverty a person or group can be said to be in based on calculations of the cost of the minimum level of resources a person or family would need to survive in the society; in other words, the bare necessities of life and only if a person falls below that level is she or he considered to be living in “absolute poverty.”

A feeling of powerlessness resulting from working in a system which ignores and isolates a person.

A type of status that a person is assigned, over which that person has no control, but this position in the system of stratification will have consequences for every aspect of the person’s life. Examples of ascribed statuses include sex and race.

Those who own the factories and other means of production in the society.

A group that individuals are assigned to by birth. In caste style systems of stratification, a person is ranked into a rigidly defined social category (caste) based on their position at birth; no effort they make during their lifetime can change this assignment.

A type of social stratification system based on both birth and individual achievement.

Societies that allow no movement at all between levels or strata in their stratification systems.

The claim that poor people are poor due to embracing a distinct set of values and beliefs that are incompatible with economic success (as opposed to being poor due to situational factors such as structural mobility downward in the nation the people live in or the people being discriminated against due to race or being born into poor families, etc.).

The claim that societies have certain positions that must be filled that are important to the maintenance and order of the society, such that it is necessary that unequal rewards be kept in place.

A belief system, including values, that justifies the social arrangements and rankings in a society.

Wages received from a job or earnings from investments.

When a person ends up moving either up or down the social stratification ladder relative to where his/her parents were situated.

What happens to a person or what the person can accomplish in their lifetime

Literally meaning recognition based on one’s merit, a meritocracy is a style of stratification system in which what one does and how well they do it determines the amount of resources that person will be allowed access to. Many people wrongly assume the United States’ style of stratification system is meritocratic. Although individual effort contributes some to where a person gets ranked in the U.S., several other factors independent of merit factor in much more heavily (e.g. family a person was born into, a person’s race, and a person’s sex – all ascribed statuses).

Societies that allow a range of movement up or down the social hierarchy of their respective stratification systems.