Soc 100 Lecture Notes PDF

Lecture Notes Lecture 7: Social Stratification & Gender Inequality Social Stratification ○ All societies sort people into higher or lower ranking groups and reward people in higher-ranking groups with more of what we value in society (health, power, respect,...

Lecture Notes Lecture 7: Social Stratification & Gender Inequality Social Stratification ○ All societies sort people into higher or lower ranking groups and reward people in higher-ranking groups with more of what we value in society (health, power, respect, etc) ○ This ranking-reward system is called social stratification Stereotype ○ a belief about a certain group of people ○ All humans use cognitive stereotypes in everyday thinking as a way of simplifying the task of perceiving and making sense of new information. ○ Stereotypes deny the possibility that there are differences among members of a group Prejudice ○ When we apply a stereotype to a particular individual, then we introduce prejudice. ○ Prejudice is a negative attitude toward a person who belongs to a group, simply because he or she belongs to that group and is therefore presumed to have the objectionable qualities ascribed to the group Discrimination ○ Involves people acting on their prejudice ○ All acts of discrimination treat people unequally because of their membership in a group. ○ Gordon Allport’s five characteristics of discriminatory behavior: Verbal rejection Bullying, name calling, etc. Avoidance Avoiding areas generally associated with these groups Active discrimination Treating people unequally for the sole reason of them being in a different group Physical attacks Extermination ○ Individual Discrimination: One person discriminates against another individual or group ○ Institutional Discrimination:  Any policy, practice, or structure that unfairly subordinates some groups while advantaging other groups Many forms of institutional discrimination appear on their face to be fair but have discriminatory consequences Can occur unintentionally Dominant & MInority Groups ○ Minority Group: a group who is singled out from other groups in society for unequal treatment based on physical or cultural characteristics. ○ Minority status is not about numbers, it's about inequality and exclusion from full participation in society. ○ Discrimination feels different for members of dominant group than it does for members of a minority group Isms ○ Sociologists categorize particularly potent kinds of discrimination into one of the “isms”: Sexism Racism Heterosexism Ableism Antisemitism Classism ○ “Isms” are different from ordinary discrimination. ○ Only acts that are consistent with institutional patterns of discrimination earn the “ism.” ○ Discriminatory acts become racism or sexism when their source is a member of the dominant group and their target is a member of a minority group. ○ Anti-male jokes can involve stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination. But in a society in which men systematically hold more power than women, such jokes cannot be sexist Gender Inequality ○ In virtually every society, men and women are not only treated differently, they are treated unequally. ○ Many observers have argued that there are biological differences in ○ the values, attitudes, and behaviors of men and women. ○ Sociologists argue that if gender inequality were the product of biological differences in sex, then inequality would look the same everywhere. ○ Gender inequality varies significantly across cultures Gender vs. Sex ○ Sex refers to the inherited biological characteristics ○ Gender consists of all the behaviors and attitudes we consider proper for our society’s men and women (masculinity and femininity). ○ The sociological significance of gender is that it is a device by which every society controls its members. Nature vs Nurture  ○ If biology is the principal factor in human behavior, then we should find women all around the world behaving one way, and men behaving in another. Margaret Mead’s Study of New Guinea ○ Arapesh: Men & women shared child rearing; both groups were kind, gentle, emotionally warm ○ Mundugumor: Both men & women were aggressive, competitive, lacking in maternal instinct ○ Tchambuli: One sex was passive, maternal, relational (M); one ran most aspects of economic/political life (W) ○ Physically, males and females in all three tribes were the same. But what it meant to be a man or woman varied tremendously across the three groups. ○ Therefore we can’t really say that these aspects of behavior are biological. Gender Socialization ○ People interact with children according to cultural expectations about gender ○ Boys & girls are dressed differently, they are taught to play with different toys and read different books, to value different behaviors ○ Barrie Thorne (1993) found that girls who attempt to cross over to the boys’ side of the playground are labeled “tomboys.” ○ Tomboys had a much easier time being accepted by the boys than a boy who crossed over to the girls’ side of the playground, who was labeled a sissy and ○ shunned by everyone. ○ Boys and girls learn from these experiences not only about gender difference, but also about gender inequality. Gender Inequality & Work ○ Sex Segregation: The phenomenon in which men work in stereotypically male jobs and women work in stereotypically female jobs. ○ Sex segregation is one of the main ways that gender inequality is maintained in the workplace: Men and women are sorted into different occupations or levels in the workplace hierarchy and then those different jobs are paid unequally. ○ Sex segregation hides the fact that there is gender discrimination involved because it seems like men and women are choosing their jobs or choosing jobs that play to their “natural” strengths. ○ One way to tell that sex segregation is not about natural strengths is to compare occupations across countries. ○ A second way is to observe what happens when a job switches from an all-male to a mixed or all-female occupation. ○ In every case where this has happened, the prestige and pay of that occupation declines (“feminization of the profession”). ○ Women on avg make 84 cents for every dollar a male makes ○ Gender pay gap exists in almost every single occupation  ○ With regard to promotions, women often hit a “glass ceiling,” a barrier beyond which they cannot go, even when fully qualified. ○ Token: a women or minority who breaks through to a managerial position and becomes a stand-in for all members of that group ○ Tokens tend to be overly scrutinized, so that as soon as they make a mistake, people’s suspicions of the inadequacy or incompetence of that group are immediately confirmed ○ Christine Williams found that men in female dominated jobs ride the “glass escalator” to the top: they tend to be promoted much more rapidly than their female colleagues. One Way Gender Revolution ○ Paula England argues that while women have experienced dramatic changes in opportunities since the gender revolution began in the 1960s, men have experienced very few changes. ○ Women are obtaining degrees in law, medicine, and business in record numbers, but there has been no similar increase in the number of men in female-dominated professional programs such as library science, social work, or nursing. ○ Parents traditionally give girls traditionally “male” toys, but not vice versa ○ Girls now regularly play in sports but boys rarely participate in dance ○ England argues that traditionally female activities and jobs have always been devalued in society, and this hasn’t changed ○ As a consequence, women have more incentive to move into nontraditional gender activities and jobs than men do ○ England argues that our implicit reference group in thinking about “moving up” in earnings and status is the previous generation of our own social class and sex. ○ Working-class women who want to “move up” in earnings and status have two choices: Cross gender-boundary into blue-collared jobs Obtain more education & enter female-dominated, middle class jobs ○ Middle-class women who want to “move up” in earnings and status must cross gender boundary into male-dominated jobs, but often enter gendered specialties ○ England observes that the paths that women take to improve their social and economic position illustrate how powerful gender norms are: they shape our reference groups, our aspirations, and what we see as our choices in life ○ The whole structure of gender inequality rests on very durable gendered distinctions between men and women Lecture 8: Gender Inequality: The Case of Pronouns Gender: ○ Refers to social characteristics rather than the biological characteristics ○ Consists of all the behaviors and attitudes we consider proper for our society’s men & women ○ We inherit our sex & are socialized into our gender  Gender identity: ○ The internal sense of being male or female ○ Cis: those who identify with their birth-assigned gender ○ Trans: those who identify with a gender that’s different from their birth-assigned gender Gender expression: ○ Descriptive concept that tells us about a person’s external presentation Sexual orientation: ○ Who a person is drawn to romantically, emotionally, and sexually The Case of Mask Wearing ○ During the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, public health guidance encouraged wearing masks and social distancing to reduce the spread of the virus ○ Why were men resistant to wearing masks more than women? Wearing masks for men meant they were being controlled by an external force Wearing masks indicates that you’re scared of getting infected Gender Binary & Hierarchy ○ Masculine: Strong Assertive Breadwinner Dominant Rational Competitive Tough Ambitious ○ Feminine: Sensitive Passive Caregiver Submissive Emotional Cooperative Delicate Empathetic Riki Wilchins’s Five Rules of Gender: ○ There are only two cages ○ Everyone must be in a cage ○ There is no middle ground ○ No one can change cages ○ No one chooses their cage Doing Gender ○ Lucal: Gender rules are mostly taken for granted  But for people who don’t follow the rules “doing gender” is something they have to consciously negotiate everyday Lucal tries not to do gender, but other people end up doing it for her. In a culture with a rigid gender binary, other people assign her to one or the other Lucal argues that every time someone mistakes her for a man, and then realizes that she’s a woman, that person has to call into question the naturalness of gender Transformations in Gender Identity ○ We can find examples of gender nonconforming people throughout the course of human history, but the visibility, legitimacy, and range of gender identities, has increased dramatically since the mid 2010s. 1952: News coverage of the transition of Christine Jorgensen, who underwent hormone and surgical treatment in Denmark, sparked the first major wave of popular interest in gender transitions. 1969: Stonewall Riots are celebrated as a moment when working class and people of color visibly rebelled against police crackdowns on bars frequented by gender nonconforming customers. 9/11/2001: The practice of indicating gender when buying airline tickets and showing official documents became a norm at airports ○ Developments in gender identity politics The first development involved the increasing legitimacy of moving from gender category to another. The narrative of being “trapped in the wrong body” has been important for generating empathy and support for the transgender community, including access to medical interventions for those who need it. Limiting for those who occupy a position between gender categories The freedom to move from one gender category did not necessarily destabilize the categories themselves The second development in gender identity politics has been the increasing acceptance of gender identity categories other than male/female New categories of gender identity and forms of gender expression can be seen as a challenge to the gender binary The Case of Pronouns: ○ The structure & content of language reflects a lot about the given culture, including inequalities Mr. vs. Ms./Mrs. Masculine gender used in place of neutral/all genders Mankind, chairman, policeman  “Male firstness” he/she ○ Language not only reflects inequalities, but it also reinforces those inequalities ○ Language structure and word choices influence how we perceive the world Pronoun Activism: ○ Preferred pronouns in introductions and taglines ○ proliferation of they/them as nonbinary pronoun & gender-neutral pronoun The Case of Pronouns: Saguy & WIlliams ○ Examined activists’ views of three different usages of the singular “they”: A nonbinary/gender conforming pronoun An indefinite pronoun when a person’s self-identified gender is unknown Universal gender-neutral pronoun Lecture 9: Race Inequality I Is Race Real? ○ Race as a biological or genetic distinction has no basis in empirical fact. ○ Research on human genome has found no genetic differences between “the races” ○ People across races are more physiologically similar than different Skin color, face shape, etc. vary more within a race than across them. ○ Things perceived as real, are real in their consequences Race is a real social distinction with real social consequences ○ Race is socially constructed Races may not exist, but the idea that “races are distinct biological categories” exists Social Construct of Race: ○ One way of observing how race is a social construction is by looking at how definitions of race vary across cultures. ○ Because racial categories vary widely across countries, we know these categories are not natural or innate but are socially constructed ○ Social groups have also shifted racial classifications within the same culture over time. Jewish, Polish, Italian, Irish, and Greek immigrants at the turn of the 20th century were all treated as “Non-White.” Non-White groups experienced similar forms of overt discrimination as blacks experienced up until the 1960s. ○ Rise of Nazi Germany illustrated what happens when ideas of racial superiority are taken to their endpoint: genocide. ○ Attitudes during WWII toward these immigrant groups began to shift, and the definition of Whiteness expanded to include formerly “non-White” groups. Race vs. Ethnicity: ○ Race:  Based on physical characteristics Stigmatized Externally imposed Involuntary Hierarchical Exclusive ○ Ethnicity: Based on cultural heritage Not stigmatized Individually chosen Voluntary Nonhierarchical More fluid and multiple Symbolic Ethnicity: ○ Mary Waters: White americans today have the option to claim a particularly ethnic ancestry argues that while symbolic ethnicity doesn’t cost the individual anything, there IS a cost to society ○ Symbolic ethnicities refer to voluntarily chosen ethnic identities that involve no real social cost for the individual ○ Involve primarily pleasurable leisure time activities & don’t influence individuals’ lives unless they want them to. ○ Problems of Symbolic Ethnicity: People who claim symbolic ethnicities tend to think that all ethnicities are equal and that like them, people from other ethnicities can turn their ethnic identities on and off at will. But there are very real differences between symbolic ethnic identities and socially imposed racial identities Racialization: ○ When any group comes to be thought of as a race, it has become racialized ○ Hispanics are officially an ethnic group. But in the United States they are socially defined in racial terms and treated as racially inferior. Racial Categories: ○ Society is continually creating and transforming racial and ethnic categories ○ The U.S. Census measures race by self-identification ○ The 2000 Census was the first time the government allowed people to record themselves in two or more racial categories. Whiteness: ○ White people tend to think of themselves as having no race at all. ○ Whiteness is seen as “normal,” racially unmarked, and therefore immune to examination.  ○ Most Sociologists study the ways that minority groups are disadvantaged, rather than the ways in which Whites are advantaged by their race. ○ Race is a fundamentally relational concept ○ Minority groups only mean something in the presence of a majority group ○ Majority groups define themselves as the norm, and they have the power to do this ○ Peggy McIntosh made up a list of taken-for-granted privileges that come with whiteness (“invisible knapsack”) ○ Whiteness is about not having to think about race at all Identity Privilege: ○ Any unearned benefit or advantage one receives in society by nature of your identity ○ Aspects of identity that confer privilege: Race Gender Sexual orientation Ability Social class Citizenship status Religion ○ Identity privilege is relative. Some forms of privilege provide greater advantages than others Benefiting from one form does not mean we benefit from all Lecture 10: Race Inequality II Residential Segregation ○ The Kerner Commission was formed by President Johnson to understand the race riots of the late 1960s. What happened? Why did it happen? How can we prevent it in the future? ○ Commission concluded that America was split into two societies: “one black, one white—separate and unequal.” ○ Main reason for the divide was residential segregation Because most people don’t know the historical origins of segregated neighborhoods, they tend to think that segregation is natural— i.e. people prefer to live alongside people who are like them. ○ Sociologists Doug Massey and Nancy Denton argue black neighborhoods were deliberately and systematically constructed by whites to keep blacks in their unequal place. Before 1900, blacks in American cities faced rampant job discrimination, but very little residential segregation.  After the turn of the century, residential segregation picked up sharply. ○ Index of Dissimilarity: a demographic tool that measures how evenly two groups are distributed across a geographic area Most commonly used by sociologists to measure the rate of discrimination ○ Boundaries separating black and white neighborhoods were policed by white residents and by police. ○ Residential covenants are legally binding agreements that limit how a property can be used or maintained. They are also known as restrictive covenants Were used as a segregating tool to ensure that only white buyers could stay in this region ○ The U.S. government’s housing policies helped create the black ghetto. ○ Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) practiced redlining, declaring certain black neighborhoods to be too much of a liability and ineligible for aid. ○ The Federal Housing Administration and Veterans’ Administration also shifted funds away from black areas and into mostly white suburbs. ○ While discriminatory government policies are no longer in practice, residential segregation today is almost as high as it was 50 years ago. ○ Residential segregation continues due to both individual discrimination and institutional discrimination. ○ Individual discrimination involves person to person discrimination Minorities are shown fewer apartments, quoted higher rents, steered to specific neighborhoods. Housing audits have found that blacks are denied available housing 35 to 75% of the time, depending on the city. The actions of landlords & real estate agents reinforce the color lines dividing neighborhoods. ○ Institutional Discrimination: Negative treatment of a minority group that is built into a society's policies and practices. It is much harder to identify, as it looks like the “normal” operation of society African American and Hispanic loan applicants are 60% more likely to be rejected for a loan than white applicants with identical credit. Minorities are also often charged far higher interest rates than white applicants. ○ Segregation is not just about people living in different neighborhoods; it’s about people living in unequal neighborhoods. Poorer schools can have major consequences for future economic prospects. Social networks in neighborhoods can have major consequences for getting a job. ○ Some sociologists argue that residential segregation reinforces a culture of poverty.  Credit Scoring ○ Credit scores are designed to measure the credit worthiness of a loan applicant. ○ The lower the credit score, the more likely you will get a loan at a higher interest rate (and vice versa). ○ While credit scores seem like they are generated using “color blind” criteria, racial inequalities are built into much of the information credit agencies use. ○ As a result, minorities have lower credit scores and pay much more for their loans. Over the lifetime of a mortgage, the higher monthly payments required of minority borrowers can add up to an extra $100,000 to $200,000 per loan. Wealth ○ Wealth refers to your net worth: (Everything you own) minus (everything you owe) ○ Wealth Disparities: The median household wealth of a White family is more than nine times greater than that of a Black family, and five times greater than a Hispanic family. The Color of Law: After WWII, the Veterans Affairs (VA) office and Fair Housing Authority (FHA) helped to subsidize the cost of purchasing homes. The FHA would not subsidize mortgages in black or racially mixed neighborhoods. The inability to buy property more than 75 years ago due segregationist policies has had long-term consequences for racial and ethnic minorities over time. ○ Wealth vs Income: Income includes earnings from work, stock dividends, pensions, unemployment, Social Security, public assistance. Wealth is not used for life necessities; it’s used to secure a desired standard of living. Wealth is what your family’s class standing and social status are based on Wealth is what gives families the opportunity to secure whatever is needed to live a “good life”—education, business training, justice, health, comfort. If income is a good indicator of the current status of racial inequality, wealth shows us the consequences of racially restricted opportunity over the course of generations. ○ Thomas Shapiro argues that wealth captures the historical consequences of racial discrimination and the accumulation of racial advantages and disadvantages over time Wealth disparities reinforce race inequalities. Invisibility of Racism ○ Many white Americans today view racism as a thing of the past.  ○ If you believe that racial discrimination is no longer a problem, then any mention of racism can be seen as illegitimate or as asking for unfair advantages ○ Black Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities meanwhile experience racism everyday: poor service surveillance in stores being ignored by salespeople receiving the worst accommodations in restaurants and hotels being confused with menial workers ○ One of the most powerful rebuttals to those who believe that racial discrimination is no longer a problem is the audit: Pairing two very similar people (one black & one white) and having them apply for a job or apartment, shop, buy a car etc. ○ Class privilege is not the same as race privilege and does not protect minorities from racial bigotry Weathering: ○ The body’s capacity to generate a “fight or flight” response to threats is not meant to be ongoing. ○ Persistent stressors cause the body to break down. ○ Race-based stress has a particularly potent and persistent effect on the body ○ Geronimus’s early research focused on racial disparities in infant mortality rates. ○ Unlike the conventional wisdom, which blamed the disparities on high rates of teen pregnancy among Black women, Geronimus found that babies of Black teens were healthier than babies of Black women in their 20s and older. ○ She hypothesized that younger women had healthier babies because they had experienced less racism-related stress ○ Geronimus’s research has found that people who experience high levels of chronic stress because of their identities and circumstances have poorer health outcomes ○ One study compared health outcomes among Black students who attended historically Black colleges and universities (HCBUs) and peers who attended predominantly white colleges and universities HBCU students had a lower risk of health problems later in life. New Racism ○ Bonilla-Silva: people who believe that discrimination is no longer a problem are practicing what he calls new racism (sometimes called colorblind racism) ○ New racism is the main force behind racial inequality today ○ Two components to new racism: Abstract liberalism Naturalization ○ Abstract Liberalism: Whites believe that everybody should compete on a level playing field: minorities should have all the same opportunities as everyone else (no discrimination) and shouldn’t receive any special opportunities.  Acting like there is an even playing field when there isn’t one actually exacerbates inequality. ○ Naturalization: Attributing race differences to human nature “It is natural for people to hang out with their own people” To treat something as natural ignores the social roots of the behavior and makes it seem like nothing can be done to change it. Lecture 11: Class Inequality Social Stratification: ○ All societies sort people into higher or lower ranking groups and reward people in higher-ranking groups with more of what we value in society This ranking-reward system is called social stratification ○ Stratification systems vary across cultures, but they tend to share three attributes: They tend to persist for a long time They are resistant to change They are bolstered by widely accepted legitimating rationales ○ Legitimating Rationales are generally accepted beliefs that something is fair and just Beliefs about why some people are ranked higher than others and why that is fair Social Stratification: Caste System ○ In caste systems, a person’s rank is determined at birth and there is no chance of changing rank in that person’s lifetime ○ Caste membership determines occupation, residence, who you can talk to, who you can wed. ○ Legitimating Rationale: Hindu belief in reincarnation. Those who live a “good life” will be born into a higher caste; those who don’t, will be born into a lower caste. In 1950, the Indian caste system was outlawed, but because of its ties to religious beliefs, the caste system retains much of its strength, enforced by informal norms and sanctions Social Stratification: Estate System ○ In estate systems, one’s place in the social hierarchy is also determined at birth. Contacts between different estates are permitted, but marriage between estates is forbidden England’s feudal system had three estates (or social strata) First Estate: Nobility Second Estate: Clergy Third Estate: Serfs ○ Legitimating Rationale: Social rank is assigned by God  Social Stratification: Class System ○ Class is based on economic position—a person’s occupation, income, and wealth ○ In theory, those who are smart, talented, and hardworking should rise to the top of the class system and vise versa ○ Legitimating Rationale: The opportunity to get ahead is available to all. ○ Social Mobility: movement between different positions within a system of social stratification e.g., working to middle class or vice versa Intergenerational Mobility: change that family members make in social class from one generation to the next. The United States is famous for its upward mobility, but social mobility goes both ways: People move from riches to rags almost as often as rags to riches Most people stay in the same social class as their parents Social mobility in the United States is about the same as in France and England, but significantly lower than Canada and most Scandinavian countries ○ Structural Mobility: mobility which is brought about by structural changes in the economy and not because of individual differences Upward Structural Mobility: people experience upward social mobility irrespective of individual efforts. Occurs during economic booms (industrial revolution, post WW2) Downward Structural Mobility: people who grew up middle class are now experiencing downward mobility due to changes in the American economy (e.g., current economic context). Effects of Class: ○ Social class is the most important variable for predicting everything from what college you go to (or whether you go to college) and what job you’ll have, to how long you’ll live Education: As you move up the social class ladder, both the type and amount of education changes Health: as you move up the social class ladder, health increases due to: Access to medical care: (being able to choose good doctors and pay for whatever treatment is prescribed) Lifestyle (higher income people tend to engage in healthier lifestyle behaviors) Socioeconomic status (SES): an individual’s place in the social order, typically based on some combination of income, occupation, wealth, and education There are no official definitions of classes, except the poor. ○ Class categories: Upper Class (1%):  often called the ruling class, as members are not only wealthy, but wield tremendous power and influence “Old” vs “New” Money Upper Middle Class (19%): Shaped the most by education. Almost all members of this class have a college and/or graduate degree Includes the major professions, people who make $100k - $274k. Class that best represents having “made it.” Lower Middle Class (25%): Semi-professionals, lower managers, craftspeople. People with a high school or college degree who make between $50K and $100k Income affords them a mainstream lifestyle, but they struggle to maintain it and could easily be pushed down a rung Working Class (35%): Unskilled blue or pink collar jobs or clerical jobs Make $25K - $50K High school diploma Jobs are less secure, more routine, and more closely supervised Little savings for life emergencies. Poor (20%): Because the United States offers public assistance for families below a certain income level, the government uses a strict definition of “poor” to determine eligibility 2023 official poverty line for a family of four: $30,000. ○ Sociologists often divide the poor into two groups: the working poor and the underclass Working Poor: Unskilled, low paying, temporary and seasonal jobs Most are high school dropouts Although they work full time, most working poor cannot make enough to live on and must supplement their income with food stamps or help from food pantries Underclass: Mostly found in inner cities Little or no connection to labor market Some are employed doing menial, low paying or temporary work, but most draw their main income from public assistance programs Cultural Capital & Tastes: ○ Social class is more than a matter of income or wealth. It is also about cultural tastes, knowledge, and habits. ○ Pierre Bourdieu: some cultural habits passed down from one generation to the next give people advantages and can be used as resources in the same way that money gives advantages and can be used as resources  These resources are known as cultural capital. People of all classes have specific cultural tastes and knowledge, but society values some tastes and knowledge more than others ○ Cultural capital refers to the financial and social payoff of knowing the tastes and habits that matter to people in higher ranking circles. The capacity to comfortably engage with authority figures is a form of cultural capital Anthony Jack argues that it’s not just academic preparation that puts many low-income minorities at risk for dropping out of college, but also differences in cultural capital. ○ Students who know the unwritten rules about how to engage with professors have more access to resources and opportunities than students who don’t know those rules That knowledge typically is acquired in more advantaged families and school settings. Jack argues that these unwritten rules can be learned But for students who arrive at college without that cultural capital suffer lower GPAs and higher dropout rates compared to their more privileged peers ○ When people move up the social class ladder, they often find themselves without the cultural capital to comfortably navigate their new station ○ The process of learning all the unwritten norms, tastes, and habits of the class(es) above you is hard, and often humiliating, and often doesn’t ever end completely. ○ Upper Class: Eats fish & tofu Drinks cocktails Classical music horse racing/golf Knows what glass is for Pinot Noir ○ Lower Class: Eats burgers Drinks beer Country music NASCAR Knows what a shop steward does Lecture 12: Intersectionality Reeves & Opportunity Hoarding ○ While conversations about economic inequality typically focus on the “super rich” and the very poor, the biggest economic divide is actually between the upper middle class (top 19%) and everybody else (bottom 80%).  ○ Between 1979 and 2013, the top 1% saw an increase in pretax income of $1.4 trillion ○ But households in the top fifth of the economic distribution (except 1%) saw an increase in pretax income of $2.7 trillion ○ For every dollar going to the 1%, two dollars went to the upper middle class. ○ Reeves offers two explanations for the increasing income of the upper middle class: Labor market value of education has increased. Upper middle-class households increasingly pool two high incomes. ○ Upper middle-class parents work hard to give their kids everything they can to ensure that they can succeed in the upper middle class Lessons Extracurriculars Sports Tutors College Prep ○ It is one thing to give your kids the best start in life you can. But it is another thing to give unfair advantages to your kids. ○ Opportunity hoarding is when the upper middle class rigs the competition in their favor ○ Opportunity hoarding involves opportunities that are Valuable Scarce Allocated in an uncompetitive way ○ Examples include legacy admissions and unpaid internships ○ Unpaid internships are increasingly necessary to obtain a professional job, but they require both social connections and money to obtain them. Class Inequality: ○ Class inequality is closely tied up with our ideas of merit, hard work, and opportunity ○ This makes it both hard to see and hard to appreciate how powerfully it shapes the life course of people in the United States Intersectionality: ○ A concept used to describe the way in which identities intersect and overlap to create unique forms of privilege and disadvantage. ○ Key intersectionality Themes: Offers a way of seeing how we can simultaneously experience the privilege of some of our identities and the disadvantages of others. Shows how discrimination and disadvantage are not just additive; categories intersect to produce unique forms of disadvantage Makes visible those experiences that are erased by the way our politics, culture, and legal system only “see” one social identity at a time. ○ History of Intersectionality:  Anna Julia Cooper argued that Black women have unique experiences and insights from both White women and Black men. Pauli Murray coined the term “Jane Crow” to describe the male-centered legal culture she found at Howard University’s Law School Audre Lorde argues that we not only carry multiple identities, but that we are aware of which identities depart from the “mythical norm.” ○ Multiple Identities: Lorde reminds us that while the experience of difference is important, focusing only on one axis of difference is distorting Intersectionality theory highlights the ways in which there are always multiple systems of oppression at work in all of us. ○ Intersectional Harms: Law Professor Kimberle Crenshaw intended “intersectionality” to describe how race, class, gender, gender identity and other characteristics intersect in ways that rend their injuries invisible to law Discrimination and disadvantage are not just additive; instead, identity categories intersect to produce unique forms of disadvantage Our legal system tends to attach injuries to only one social identity at a time. DeGraffenreid v. General Motors lawsuit Court ruled that “black women” were not a protected class under our civil rights laws GM hired white women, so no gender discrimination occurred GM hired black men, so no racial discrimination occurred The court erased the unique harm experienced by black women Intersectionality raises questions about whether the categories we use to claim rights and benefits do more harm than good Intersectionality gives us a way of thinking about what it means for systems of inequality to be interactive What are the common features of sexism and racism? What are the common features of patriarchy and heterosexism? Crenshaw suggests that the best view of the mechanisms by which inequality is reproduced may come from those who stand at the intersection of multiple systems of power. And yet it is these voices that are most frequently silenced. ○ Erasing Intersectional Harms Lorde & Crenshaw emphasize different ways that U.S. culture and politics tend to erase intersectional harms. Audre Lorde observes that naming gendered violence within the Black community can be seen as a “betrayal.” The cultural expectation that we prioritize one identity over others is a way of erasing intersectional harms. Crenshaw focuses on the invisibility of police violence against Black women in the media.  Professor Brooklyn Hitchens and colleagues conducted a study of police experiences among low-income Black, Latina, and White women (ages 14-24) in Philadelphia. Found that only Black and Latina women described police sexual harassment and gender-based victimization. Women of color experience sexual misconduct more frequently than white women, and those experiences are often racialized, meaning that they are targeted based on racist and sexist stereotypes about sexuality, body autonomy, and physical features Professor Kamaria Porter asked: “If black women and nonbinary students experience campus sexual misconduct more frequently than other students, why are they less likely to report those experiences to school authorities?” Porter finds that students in her study experienced a double bind: ○ They feared that school authorities would rely on sexist and racist myths about sexual violence and not believe their accounts ○ They feared that they would be believed too much – that authorities would use their injuries as a reason to bring the full brunt of punishment against the Black community Lecture 13: Family I What are social institutions? ○ Generally: a recognized solution to a social problem ○ Specifically: an accepted group of interdependent roles, values, and norms that respond to important societal needs and that reproduce themselves over time. ○ Institutions develop gradually & without planning ○ People try a range of solutions to solve any social problem and eventually some solutions are accepted as the “best” way to meet their needs. ○ The solutions we choose are not always the most efficient but tend to be consistent with our social values and norms ○ Over time, the “best” solution becomes habitualized ○ Institutionalized behavior seems logical and natural and right, so the thought of solving the problem some other way seems illogical, unnatural, and wrong. ○ Social institutions are very slow to change ○ Institutions are interdependent: change in one social institution can cause changes in other institutions. WWII disrupted popular notions of (middle-class, white ) women as too physically and emotionally fragile to work in the paid labor market. Women stepped in to take men’s places in factories when men went to war. Most were forced out of these jobs when men returned, but by then it became clear that (middle-class, white) women could work outside the home. ○ As women have increasingly entered the labor force, new needs in the family were created (E.g,. child care, housework).  The Family Defined ○ Every human group in the world organizes its members in families, but cultures experience and define families very differently ○ A family consists of people who consider themselves related by blood, marriage, or adoption ○ A family is distinct from a household, those people who occupy the same housing unit ○ Nuclear Family: parents and children ○ Extended Family: nuclear family plus grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins Myths of the Family: ○ The myth of a stable and harmonious family of the past. Myth: Most people think that families of the past were more stable, harmonious, and happy than families of today. Historians generally agree that there was never a “golden age” of the family (see Coontz). ○ The myth of the monolithic family form. Myth: The “traditional family” is made up of a (white, middle-class) male breadwinner and a female homemaker with kids who live together in a one-family house Myth: Children grow up best when they are raised by families headed by married, biological parents. This myth assumes the following: Biological parents are better than non biological parents at raising children Mothers and fathers each contribute something unique that the other can’t provide Children do best when they have two parents who are preferably married Most U.S. families do NOT fit the “traditional family” model. ○ More common: single-parent families, unmarried couples, gay and lesbian families, step-families, foster families, and multigenerational families. What is most important for children is the quality of relationships they have with the people who care for them—not their sex or marital status or their number Biblarz and Stacey (2010): Biological ties to children do not explain differences in successful parenting. Studies comparing lesbian co-mothers (where only one parent was biologically related to child) with opposite-sex parents (where both parents were biologically related to child) found that the parenting practices of lesbian co-parents generally scored higher Both men and women are equally capable of doing all kinds of parenting  Two compatible parents (married or unmarried, gay or straight, biologically related or not) provide more material/emotional resources than one parent. ○ BUT this does not mean that there is something inherently problematic about one-parent families. One-parent families are more likely to have fewer resources and support. Economists found that children of same-sex couples perform better in schools than kids raised by opposite sex couples. Explanation: same-sex parents tend to be older, wealthier, and more educated than the average opposite sex parents. This myth persists because the “traditional family” was never a lived reality for millions of Americans. Enslaved men and women developed strong kinship ties with extended family and provided mutual aid and emotional support to each other. Carol Stack’s study of families in a low-income black community found that families adapt to poverty today by forming similarly large, complex support networks. “Fictive Kinship” – stretching the boundaries of kinship to include non blood relations, friends, neighbors, coworkers. ○ The myth of a unified family experience Myth: Most people think family members experience family life in the same way—i.e., the family is a unit. Sociologist Jessie Bernard once said that every (straight) marriage is actually two different relationships: the woman’s marriage and the man’s marriage. The family is a gendered institution, and men and women experience marriage differently. Today, most women work outside the home, but women still do the vast majority of housework and child care—what Hochschild calls the “second shift.” Kathleen Gerson’s study of “children of the gender revolution” finds that the vast majority of young people want an egalitarian marriage (equal breadwinning, housekeeping, and childrearing) But if men and women’s ideals are very similar, their fallback positions are very different. Men’s fallback position: 70% want traditional marriage Women’s fallback position: 75% want self-reliance. Some women try to do it all (the Supermom strategy) but most women who try this burn out. Married women are more likely than married men to think about divorce. In most families, children do not experience family life the same way. Resources from parents (attention, time, money, social connections) are unevenly distributed among children  Parents invest a lot in their first-born child. That child gets 100% of their parents' attention and resources. Children born later will never get that. Such exclusive parenting is thought to produce fitter, smarter, more confident first-born children. First-born children have on average a 3-point IQ advantage over the next born. First-born children are more likely to have more (and better) education than siblings, and to earn more later in life. The pecking order among children is not determined by the natural abilities of each child or even by the intentions of parents. Social forces such as gender expectations, the costs of education, labor market conditions, divorce, etc. shape how resources are distributed among children. When parents have plenty of resources to go around, there are fewer birth order differences among children, because parents don’t have to choose between them But when parental resources are stretched thin (due to financial hardship, large family size, short spacing between kids, single parenthood, etc.), then the life paths of siblings tend to diverge Inequalities in society begin in the home. ○ The myth of separate worlds Myth: The family is a place of refuge, safety, love, and trust, where individuals can escape the harshness of the outside world The most dangerous of the myths of the family, as it masks the problems of intimate partner violence and child abuse. Intimate partner violence is the single largest cause of injury to women in the United States According to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, there were nearly 680,000 reported child victims of abuse or neglect in 2022.  Many scholars view violence in the home as part of a culture that sees violence as legitimate (and even appropriate) when it takes place within the family. ○ The myth of family decline as the cause of social problems. Myth: Many of our society’s problems today can be traced to the breakdown of the family The social institution of the family is changing. But there have also been changes to our economy, workplace, political system, legal system, as well dramatic increases in social inequality. All of these changes play a role in creating our current social problems—not just changes in the family. Social scientists have the capacity to study not only what family behaviors work and don’t work, but also to identify what families need in order to make them work. Lecture 14: Family II- Marriage Marriage as a social institution ○ The most common foundation for family in the world ○ Widely accepted as the best way of solving society’s need to socialize children, to transfer property, to regulate sexuality, etc. Economic benefits of marriage ○ Married people have significantly greater wealth than single people ○ A person who marries & stays married accumulates almost twice as much wealth as a single or divorced person ○ People who divorce lose approx. ¾ of their personal net worth Social benefits of marriage: ○ The presence of two parents is associated with increased child wellbeing. More parental supervision More resources Better education Health benefits of marriage: ○ Married people are more likely to engage in healthy behaviors than single people ○ Problem drinking, substance abuse, and other risk-taking behavior are all much rarer among married individuals than unmarried individuals ○ Married men and women face a lower risk of dying prematurely than those who have never married or whose previous marriage ended Deinstitutionalization of marriage ○ Andrew Cherlin argues that marriage as an institution is becoming deinstitutionalized ○ Traditional social norms about marriage are weakening, and we are starting to see new social rules and new ways of being in relationships.  ○ Americans value marriage highly (85-90% of Americans will eventually get married), but have the highest divorce rate of any industrialized country in the world. ○ Divorce rates have little to do with personal values and a lot to do with personal economics: the lower the income, the greater the likelihood of divorce. Two-parent families that are poor are twice as likely to divorce as two-parent families that are not poor ○ Another contributor to the divorce rate is the increased independence of women Since the 1960s, women have been able to live increasingly full lives outside of marriage Today, more men than women list marriage as part of an ideal lifestyle ○ Another cause of increased divorce rates is increased tolerance for divorce Many religions, generally see divorce today not as a moral failure, but as a solution for couples who are experiencing real difficulties in their marriage. ○ A final contributor to the increased divorce rate: No-fault divorce laws have made it easier to obtain a divorce ○ Over a lifetime, just under half of all marriages fail. (Note that this is NOT the same as saying your marriage has a 50% chance of failing.) ○ The risk of divorce varies tremendously among different social groups. Arranged marriages: bride and groom are selected by parents or other family members The lowest divorce rates in the world are in cultures with high rates of arranged marriages ○ Americans have the highest re-marriage rates in the industrial world: four out of every five people who obtain a divorce will remarry. With the rise in divorce, we’ve also seen a sharp rise in blended families or stepfamilies. ○ Other trends that are contributing to what Cherlin calls the deinstitutionalization of marriage: Delayed marriage Cohabitation Same-sex marriage Delayed Marriage: ○ Young people are delaying marriage longer than ever before. Both men and women are more likely to attend college and begin careers today before they get married ○ Average age of first marriage in U.S. today is 28 for women and 30 for men (compared to 20 and 22 back in 1960) Cohabitation: ○ unmarried people in a romantic relationship living together ○ The majority of all marriages today begin as cohabiting relationships. ○ Many young people today view cohabitation as a trial marriage—a way of assessing whether two people are truly compatible.  ○ there is also evidence to suggest that the cohabitation trend is not a new stage in relationships, but an alternative to marriage In the 1970s, the proportion of cohabiting relationships that transitioned into marriage within three years was 60% In the 1990s, that proportion dropped to 30% for women without a college education and 53% for college educated women. ○ Steven Nock argues that marriage and cohabitation are qualitatively different relationships. The different stems from the degree of institutionalization ○ Cohabitation is an incomplete institution: while it is a widespread practice, it is not yet governed by strong norms State Recognition of Relationships ○ Another important difference between cohabitation and marriage is state recognition. ○ The importance of state recognition was made salient by the movement to legalize same-sex marriage Kathy Hull argues that the fight over same-sex marriage was more than a battle for legal rights; it was for the cultural legitimacy and social inclusion marriage bestows Even in states where marriage was not available to same-sex couples, those couples used cultural practices to define and celebrate their relationships as marriages Inequalities of Marriage ○ Cherlin argues that marriage may not be as dominant as it once was, but it is more distinctive than it once was ○ Marriage is no longer something you just automatically do when you’re of age. It’s become a status symbol. ○ In many ways, the value of marriage has gone up, not down ○ If marriage has become what you do when you feel like you have your “adult” life together, people who don’t have secure jobs, housing, etc. are reluctant to get married. This varies with socioeconomic status. ○ Recent research on marriage finds that: The more inequality there is in society, the more marriage becomes a privilege for the most advantaged Because people today are more likely to marry people like themselves, these differences between classes are growing over time ○ Assortative mating: people marry people like themselves (similar education, earnings, values, lifestyle) ○ Edin’s study of low-income single mothers sought to answer the following question: If single women and children struggle so much with poverty and other challenges, why don’t they just get married? Edin finds that low-income single mothers DO still aspire to marriage, but marriage to the kinds of men who fathered their children or live in their neighborhood carries more risks than rewards.  ○ Marriage is declining in the U.S. not because of changes in values about commitment, but because of changes in the economy. ○ As inequality has grown, marriage has become less accessible for most Americans. ○ Inequalities relating to marriage reproduce themselves: People who are married tend to be more advantaged and are most likely to be marrying people like themselves (doubly advantaged) Parents’ income/education have enormous effect on children’s opportunities and advantages Lecture 15: Primary & Secondary Education Education as a social institution: ○ Education helps solve: The need to teach basic skills and impart knowledge The ned to teach specific skills for the workplace The need for socialization ○ Functional Illiteracy: the inability to read or write well enough to be a functioning member of society. (Affects 14% of adult Americans.) ○ Functional Innumeracy: the lack of math skills to function in society. (Affects 22% of adult Americans.) ○ Because of its power to socialize, schools have always been viewed as a place to assimilate immigrants ○ Experience of American Indians suggests that using schools to assimilate has in some cases caused significant harm Ideology of Mass Education: ○ Regardless of social background, all children in the United States should receive a good education so they can participate fully as citizens and workers. ○ By 1870, all states had elementary schools ○ From 1910-1940, secondary schools were transformed from elite institutions to mass institutions—free and open to everybody ○ Attendance in high schools increased from 15% to more than 70% ○ The ideology of mass education makes the presence of educational inequality problematic ○ Social scientific evidence suggests that educational opportunities are not in fact equal, and that our education system plays a key role in reproducing social inequality. Education Inequality: ○ Outside of the South there were no Jim Crow laws, but residential segregation meant that public schools were also highly segregated. ○ 1964 Coleman Report: School achievement gaps were due in part to the composition of students in schools. ○ Policymakers implemented mandatory busing plans to try to help overcome the effects of residential segregation ○ School bussing programs did help reduce school segregation, but it also produced white flight—large numbers of white families who moved out of the cities and into the suburbs. ○ Kozol argues that schools today are just as segregated as they were in the 1950s, and schools that were once successfully integrated are now re-segregating: Chicago Public Schools: 87% Black or Hispanic Detroit Public Schools: 94% Black or Hispanic Baltimore Public Schools: 90% Black or Hispanic ○ Kozol argues that schools today use the term “diversity” in cases where “segregation” would be much more accurate School officials, parents, policymakers, and media refuse to even name the problem ○ The primary source of funding for schools comes from local tax revenues. Schools located in wealthy neighborhoods have more money to spend per student than schools located in poor neighborhoods ○ 1964 Coleman report found that resources in schools don’t matter for student outcomes as much as: Student composition of schools Family background ○ Downey & Gibbs (2010) also argue that when it comes to inequality, schools are not the problem, they’re part of the solution. ○ They find that when children begin school, they are already showing different levels of academic skills, depending on their socio-economic status (SES). ○ Oral language is connected to reading comprehension: kids from low-income families are already behind in reading when they start kindergarten. ○ Students whose parents have a higher SES tend to get better grades, they are more likely to graduate from high school, they score better on cognitive tests, and they tend to get more schooling. Parents can afford tutors, SAT prep classes, a house in a good school district, college education, extracurriculars Parents may feel more comfortable helping kids with homework or intervening with teachers and school administrators ○ Downey & Gibbs wanted to measure the separate influences of school and non school factors on student outcomes They find that both high and low SES students gained academic skills at the same rate during the school year Gaps in skills developed during the summer, when students weren’t in school. ○ Since the Coleman Report, researchers have refined their methods and identified links between school characteristics and student achievement outcomes. Culprits include:  Class size Tracking Teachers ○ The inequalities in our education system make it much more likely that any given student will end up in the same social class as their parents Class Size: ○ 1985 study in Tennessee randomly assigned students and teachers to small classes (13-17 students) and regular- sized classes (22-26 students) ○ Researchers tracked participants from kindergarten to third grade ○ They found that students in smaller classes experienced higher achievement test scores and had fewer disciplinary problems. These benefits proved to be long lasting Tracking: ○ Tracking sorts students into different classes, either by ability or by future plans ○ The idea is to create a better learning environment for students by making sure their goals/abilities match their curricula ○ Students from privileged backgrounds are significantly more likely to end up in college tracks, even after taking into account ability ○ Students from lower SES backgrounds tend to be overrepresented in non-college tracks. ○ Another problem with tracking is that the quality of teaching and content of subject matter varies between tracks ○ Lower tracks put students from disadvantaged backgrounds at a further disadvantage due to inferior teachers, resources, content, etc Teachers:  ○ We know that some teachers are more effective than others, but researchers have not been able to identify what it is exactly about teachers that affects achievement ○ In one famous 1960s experiment, researchers administered IQ tests to elementary school kids at the start of the year ○ They then randomly selected one-fifth of the students and told teachers that these students were especially bright ○ At the end of the year, those students did significantly better on a second IQ test than their peers ○ In 1968, Jane Elliott performed her famous “blue eyes/brown eyes” classroom experiment in Riceville, Iowa ○ The effect of teacher expectations on student achievement works both ways: Students can benefit from high expectations, but achievement can also suffer from low expectations ○ Teachers have lower expectations of boys, minorities, and low-income students ○ Ann Ferguson’s study of low-income Black boys finds that school labeling practices marginalized black male youth, isolating them into disciplinary spaces and branding them as criminally inclined ○ Most boys aspired to become professional athletes and didn’t work hard in the classroom. School officials labeled them troublemakers. Long-term effects of being labeled a troublemaker: Lose time in classroom, skills gap widens, and students become less invested in school There is a direct relationship between dropping out of school and doing time in jail. Back to Integration: ○ Journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones finds that the only school reform that has successfully cut the achievement gap between black and white students (by half!) is integration. Lecture 16: College Education Inequality in Higher Education: ○ Only a fraction of minority and low-income students go to college. Of those who do go to college, few will graduate ○ At elite colleges and universities, less than 5% of students come from the bottom quartile of the income spectrum. Only 3.6% of students at the University of Michigan come from the bottom 20% income spectrum 66% of the students make up the top 20% of the income spectrum Every 4 out of 10 students from the top 1 percent attend an Ivy League or elite university  roughly the same share of students from poor families who attend ANY 2- or 4-year college. HIstory of Higher Education: ○ From 1949 to 1999, the proportion of the population going to college increased by 800% ○ Today 37% of Americans have a college degree ○ Pre WW2, a degree was not necessary to obtain a good job Only the wealthy went to college to learn social skills & network ○ Post WW2, the GI Bill made college more affordable to returning soldiers, allowing people to attend college This surge of college attendance made a degree a requirement to be competitive ○ To distinguish themselves academically, students focus on the university’s prestige, rather than the education amount received Prior to 1920s, everyone who met the academic requirements of elite institutions got accepted In 1918, 20% of Harvard freshmen were Jewish. Admission committees start using other criteria to limit the Jewish population Personal interviews & essays were used to identify applicants who committees viewed as belonging to the “undesirable” socioeconomic statuses Princeton’s 1-4 rating system for applicants: 1= “very desirable and apparently exceptional material from every point of view.” 4 = “undesirable from the point of view of character, and therefore to be excluded no matter what the results of the entrance examinations might be.” ○ In 1942, Harvard began using the Stanford Achievement Test (SAT) in admissions, and other colleges soon followed The SAT: ○ The SAT is supposed to predict a student’s potential for college success Research on the SAT is mixed ○ Much of the predictive power of the SAT comes from the correlation between the test and family background. When family background is held constant, the test loses most of its predictive power. ○ The SAT is highly susceptible to coaching. People who can afford to take SAT prep classes perform better on the SAT than students who don’t take prep classes. ○ Not clear that SAT scores reflect the abilities that matter ○ There is increasing evidence that non-cognitive skills (e.g., leadership, ability to meet goals, persistence, ability to overcome obstacles, “grit”) are better predictors of college success than the kinds of knowledge assessed by the SAT  Affirmative Action ○ Affirmative Action: a set of policies that use race, ethnicity, sex, or other factors in decision making in order to integrate institutions ○ Began in the 1960s. At that time only 2% of students in northern colleges were black. Policies included: “quota systems” (reserving a certain number of spots for minorities) “plus factor” admissions (giving minority candidates extra points in the selection process). ○ All race-based preferences in public universities violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibit the state from discriminating on the basis of race ○ The Supreme Court permits race-based preferences only if the state can demonstrate a compelling state interest for relying on race ○ In 1978 Bakke v. Regents of the University of California: Supreme Court ruled quotas as illegal Race can be taken into consideration as a “plus factor” in admissions if a university has a history of discriminating against minorities ○ In 1996, California passed Proposition 209, which prohibited the use of race in any government hiring or public university admissions decisions in California ○ In 2003, the Supreme Court heard two cases against the University of Michigan. The Court ruled that: Diversity is a compelling state interest that justifies taking race into account in admissions Universities have to consider race as part of individualized assessments of each candidate ○ In 2006, the state of Michigan passed Proposal 2, amending the state constitution to prohibit affirmative action in public education, government contracting, and public employment ○ In 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Prop. 2 (Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action) ○ In 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively ended race-based affirmative action in college admissions ○ Students for Fair Admissions claimed that Harvard discriminated against Asian American students who had SAT scores and GPAs higher than any other racial group ○ Asian Americans made up 29% of entering class, but plaintiffs claimed that number could have been higher without affirmative action Harvard argued that each class has 1,600 slots. Competing for those slots are 35,000 applicants, including 3700 perfect math SAT scores 2700 perfect verbal SAT scores 8000 perfect GPAs  ○ While Black and Latino students continue to be underrepresented in elite universities, their numbers increased significantly under ○ Minority enrollments declined in flagship schools in California, Texas, Washington, and Michigan after statewide affirmative action bans affirmative action Diversity: ○ Evidence suggests that diversity benefits all students, not just those admitted under affirmative action policies. ○ Students of all races learn better in a diverse educational environment, and they are better prepared to become active democratic citizens post-graduation ○ Pat Gurin, the Nancy Cantor Distinguished University Professor Emerita of Psychology and Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan, is one of the nation’s leading experts on the effects of diversity on college education Students learn more and think in deeper, more complex ways in a diverse educational environment Complex thinking (where real learning happens) occurs when people encounter a new situation for which they have no script ○ Studies consistently find that racial diversity on college campuses is key to producing complex thinking Most students come to Ann Arbor from segregated backgrounds, so social diversity on campus is unfamiliar ○ Studies find that students who experience the most racial and ethnic diversity in classrooms and in informal interactions with peers show Greatest engagement in active thinking Highest growth in intellectual engagement and motivation Highest growth in intellectual and academic skills ○ Other studies (including Levine & Stark’s) have also found that diverse groups improve accuracy, performance, information recall, and critical thinking. ○ Students with the most diversity experiences in college have the most cross-racial interactions five years after college:  More likely to have cross-racial post college friendships and work associates More likely to live in racially integrated neighborhoods ○ Diversity has become the main argument for affirmative action today ○ Moves away from arguments about merit and toward components of a good learning environment—training students to be educated citizens and skilled workers Admissions Practices at Elite Universities: ○ Race is NOT the only factor admissions committees consider for preferential treatment ○ In actuality, the biggest admissions preferences go to athletes and legacies (children of alumni) ○ At some schools, legacies increase your chances of admission by 20%, and legacies make up 10-25% of the student population ○ Admissions committees also regularly give preferences for: Leadership experience Geographic locations Unusual life experiences ○ The students who will likely benefit the most from the end of race-based preferences are not white students but Asian students Asian students get significantly better grades and higher test scores than white students The most underrepresented students at elite universities are working class, white Christians from conservative states Academic Mismatch Critique: ○ Students admitted under affirmative action may have weaker academic preparation compared to their classmates at elite universities ○ These students very quickly feel overwhelmed, lose confidence, and start underperforming—reinforcing the stereotype that they are weak students ○ Some studies find that Black and Latino students do tend to have lower GPAs in college compared to white students BUT studies have also found that minority students admitted with lower SAT scores than white students perform equally well later in life on a wide variety of measures, including professional achievement and community service Lecture 17: Work & the Economy The economy as a social institution: ○ The social institution that deals with the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services in a particular society is an economic system Three Features of Capitalism:  ○ Private ownership of the means of production (individual citizens owning land, machines, factories) ○ Pursuit of profits ○ Market competition (owners decide what to sell, prices, etc.) ○ Pure capitalism does not exist anywhere. The government is still involved in the economy Capitalism: ○ Private property: all our possessions and the right to shield those possessions from others ○ The conventional wisdom is that private property gives us a zone of individual freedom where the government cannot intrude However, all property rights are delegations of power from the state The state defines the rules for the purchase and inheritance of property and enforces the rights of owners to exclude non-owners from their property. ○ The US has welfare capitalism: private citizens own the means of production and pursue profits, but within a system of laws designed to protect the welfare of the population and to collect taxes. Examples include: Compliance with the FDA Manufacturing must meet hygiene, safety, and waste regulations Must pay Social Security taxes plus minimum wage No discrimination Tax payments Three Features of Socialism: ○ Government ownership of the means of production ○ Central planning ○ Distribution of goods without a profit motive (goal is to distribute goods without considering ability to pay) Socialism: ○ No purely socialist economies ○ While socialist countries emphasize equality, the reality is that some people must be paid higher salaries in order to get them to take on greater responsibilities ○ Socialism and communism are not the same thing. Communism is a hypothetical economic and political system in which all members of a society are socially equal ○ Capitalism Critics: Capitalism produces a tiny group of wealthy owners who thrive at the expense of the rest of the working population Wealthy owners exert undue political power and influence ○ Socialism Critics: Socialism does not respect individual rights. The government controls most aspects of people’s lives Socialistic economies are not productive. They may experience greater equality, but this just means everyone has an equal chance to be poor  Convergence Theory: ○ As economies continue to globalize, capitalist and socialist systems have begun adopting features from one another. This may eventually lead to a new hybrid economic system History of the US Economy: ○ Nomadic hunter-gatherers worked together to provide food, shelter, and clothing Too few material resources for “ownership” ○ Agricultural Revolution: 10,000 years ago, people in Egypt and China learned how to grow predictable crops. They established permanent settlements First signs of a division of labor emerge Markets emerge when villages start to exchange goods and services. The economy becomes a social institution Agricultural economy lasted for thousands of years ○ It ended with the birth of the Watts steam engine, which triggered the Industrial Revolution in the mid 1700s ○ Industrial economies differed from agricultural economies in at least four ways: Power: Machines could do 100 times the work of human or animal muscles Centralization: Manufacturing moved people out of their individual homes to a central factory. Work and family life became two distinct worlds for first time Specialization: In the early 1900s, Fredrick Taylor suggested that the efficiency of factory production could be improved if each worker were responsible for performing just one task Henry Ford adopted “Taylorism” in his plant in Highland Park, Michigan, reducing the price of the Model T from $780 to $360 Ford’s assembly line reduced production time from 12 ½ hours to just 93 minutes. Wage Labor: Workers get regular paychecks (as opposed to farmers, who only get paid when (or if) their crops come in) The $5 wage became known as a family wage, or a wage paid to male workers that was sufficient enough to support a wife and children This led to the whole idea of a “traditional” family, with a male breadwinner, and a female dependent The gender bias built into the family wage continues to the present day. Women still earn on average 83 cents to a man’s dollar. ○ Industrial economies reigned for over two centuries, but eventually gave way to our current economy: the post-industrial economy Less emphasis on manufacturing and more emphasis on research, development, finance, investment, and advertising Jobs in a post-industrial economy require much more education than in manufacturing  Today, people with limited education are more likely to be either unemployed or in low-paying service jobs The modern economy also features a global division of labor The Work Experience: A Comparative Perspective ○ Compared to pre-industrial societies, we work fewer hours than ever before ○ But Americans today work longer hours, with fewer vacations, than citizens in any other industrialized country Most workers in European countries receive about 4 to 6 weeks of paid vacation time every year. Workers in the United States get 10 days off a year for public holidays. 1 in 4 workers has no paid vacation time ○ In most other countries, governments have created policies to make it easier for workers to care for families ○ Other countries view both work and parenting as important to the well being of society, and therefore provide strong support systems to assist working families Day care Health care Flextime Telecommuting Job sharing ○ Workers in the United States are left to their own devices to figure out how to combine work and family ○ But even when companies do offer family-friendly policies, workers often don’t take advantage of them Work and Family ○ Arlie Hochschild studied a large, progressive manufacturing company that offered family-friendly policies and spent millions of dollars educating workers about the policies Yet, very few workers used the policies ○ Hochschild interviews workers and finds that working parents don’t take advantage of family-friendly policies because they want to avoid their homes and families ○ Another reason workers may be reluctant to use family-friendly policies is the fear that supervisors will perceive them as being less committed to their jobs ○ Evidence supports this fear: Employed mothers suffer a wage penalty of 5% per child after controlling for other factors that affect wages ○ Ann Crittendon argues that most of the pay gap that remains between men and women can be attributed to working moms and the wage penalty ○ Other studies have found that mothers are evaluated as less competent than non-mothers, and that pregnant women are judged by managers as less committed to their jobs, less dependable, and less authoritative ○ Shelley Correll argues that people in our culture have contradictory beliefs about “family devotion” and “work devotion.” “Ideal” mothers are supposed to always be on call for their children.  “Ideal” workers are supposed to always be on call for their jobs Working mothers who are prioritizing their children can’t prioritize their work, and therefore must be less committed workers. ○ Correll’s study asked undergraduates to evaluate application materials for two applicants for a marketing position. Files were identical except for parental status Evaluators rated mothers as less competent and less committed than nonmothers. Fathers faced no such discrimination. In fact, they were advantaged over childless men. ○ Correll’s study also did an audit of real hiring: sent resumes and cover letters from a pair of equally qualified same gender applicants to over 600 jobs. The resumes again differed only by parental status ○ Employers called non-mothers back twice as often as mothers. Fathers were not disadvantaged at all. ○ “Mommy Tax”: Crittendon finds that women who care for children or aging parents see dramatically reduced earnings over their work life (the “mommy tax”) For college educated women, the “tax” could easily exceed $1 million over their work lives The Experience of Work ○ White Collar Jobs: Knowledge-based work. Doctors, lawyers, teachers, scientists, engineers, architects, journalists, business administrators, and other professionals Often requires a graduate degree Earn the highest salaries and the most prestige and have greatest opportunities for advancement ○ Blue Collar Jobs: Production-based work, including everything from construction work to forestry, electricians, bricklayers, plumbers, bus drivers, truck drivers, etc Occupied mainly by men These jobs have seen the steepest decline in the post-industrial economy ○ Pink Collar Jobs: Secretaries, wait staff, sales clerks, and other jobs usually held by women Tend to be lower paying, lower prestige jobs than blue-collar jobs ○ Ehrenreich left her very comfortable upper-middle class life to see if she could actually make a living at the kind of jobs available in the United States for unskilled workers Ehrenreich’s experiment was a response to political rhetoric around welfare reform: that cutting welfare recipients off would lift women out of poverty, inflate their self esteem, and improve their future value on the labor market Ehrenreich concludes that if she couldn’t make service jobs work, even with all the advantages she brought to the situation, then surely single mothers and other welfare recipients would also have a difficult time  She also finds that these jobs are far from morally uplifting—they are “fraught with insult and stress.” Minimum Wage: ○ Nearly 1 in 7 workers spend at least half their work lives in jobs that are at or near minimum wage ○ The working poor include another 25 million workers who earn a dollar or two more than the minimum wage ○ Federal minimum wage: $7.25/hr. Living Wage: ○ Many cities and states have legislated “living wage” ordinances, mandating that workers be paid enough to allow a single, full-time worker to acquire adequate food, shelter, clothes, and transportation. Lecture 18: The Great Recession The Great Recession: ○ Began in 2007 when the housing bubble burst ○ Unemployment during the recession was both very high, but also persistent ○ In 2009, the average duration of unemployment surpassed 6 months (the highest on record, since the Bureau of Labor Statistics started tracking i