Social Stratification

It is not earned, but rather something people are either born with or had no control over (sociology. About. Com). Contrary to ascribed status is achieved status which is a position in a social system that is acquired on the basis Of merit, a Status that is earned or chosen and reflects a person’s skills, abilities and efforts (sociology. About. Com).

The former is more related to oligarchy, which means the social system of a state is under the political control of a small elite group, and patrimonial capitalism while the latter would be tied closely to meritocracy and democracy.The main argument is that the former is what is prevailing at present and this would be analyses further in this essay. One of the central arguments raised by these economists was that ‘patrimonial capitalism’ that once dictated the world for the longest time has actually returned and would be here to stay if legislators fail to take the appropriate actions deemed necessary in order to narrow the social inequality.

The term patrimonial capitalism is actually means that the economic elite more often than not acquire their wealth through inheritance rather than their own merits of entrepreneurship, perhaps.Take for example the top 10 richest Americans on the Forbes list. Four of them are Wall-Mart errs while two are the Koch brothers. Which means that 6 out of 10 richest Americans mostly inherited their money and this spectrum would be getting larger and larger as the high earners at the top of the economy; the top 1% of the population is the ones who are getting more affluent due to the monetary gains that they have.

The returns they earn from the existing capital are considerably higher than the rate of which the economy grows and this results to the all too infamous saying ‘The rich gets richer, the poor gets poorer” and the explosion of inequality. At this rate, the future, if it is already to happening, is going to be dominated by inherited wealth as capital concentrates in fewer and fewer hands thus giving the rich ever guarded power of a politics governance, which further explains patrimonial capitalism.Considering that this group of elites, those who have the ascribed status, have amassed huge wealth that brings them to buy over anything that entails them too, and that also includes buying of the state governance and politics, which is a fragile entity that could bring about negative consequences at the wrong hands. The most relevant sociological theory on social class that applies to the tuition at hand would be Karl Mar’s Conflict Theory Perspective on Class.Based in this idea, he believes that there are only two classes of people, the bourgeoisie (owners of the means of production such as factories and businesses and equipments required for the production of wealth) and the proletariat (simply put, the laborers). According to Mar’s theory, in the contemporary and capitalist world we live in today, the bourgeoisie exploit workers without them even realizing it. Employees are paid adequately enough to afford food and shelter and have a misconception that they are ell paid and well-to-do.

But they fail to realize the difference between being in a privileged position as compared to being wealthy. With the bourgeoisie gaining from the revenues of productions and only a certain percentage going into labor income, the understanding that the middle class expands as capitalism progresses, dawns upon us. An example of a society, although most societies are, that is falling under this category would be India.Although there are so many other countries that are facing such a social inequality, it is highly evident in India due to the poor governance and the absence of distribution of wee lath. We can distinctly see the class distinction between the rich (who live in well acclaimed estates) and the poor (who would be begging on the streets for money just to feed themselves for one meal). Wealth is just handed down from generation to generation and ultimately only those who belong to the high social class such as the Brahmins are the ones holding on to most of the state’s wealth.Undeniably, there are people in India who have been pulled out of poverty due to the lean towards capitalism and by the growing wages attributable to sheer economic growth, but the argil is minuscule.

There is still inequality that is prevalent due to the uneven growth of returns to capital in conjunction to outfit (simply put, the profit earned as compared to the wages). The top notch management benefit from the profits more as compared to those workers who receive a small rise in wages.This is basically what is happening in a lot of societies with global inequality due to ascribed status and is termed under oligarchy. Another point brought up is that in comparison to other European states, like the United Kingdom, have high taxation of all income but equalize it with the reverence of aids like universal healthcare, income support for lower income groups and for young parents. There is a redistribution of wealth whereby the government takes more from those who can afford it in order to aid those who are less affluent.However, in the US, such a phenomenon fails to exist. There is high taxation Of capital income only and even on that earnings, US do not believe in redistribution of wealth, thus leading to them having a larger amount of disposable income as compared to other countries all with due respect to the government policies.

What they fail to realize is that taking a retrain percentage of wealth from the top 1% of the wealthy people and directing it to the bottom 20% of the population is going to make a huge difference in the quality of life.There could be health reforms and health insurances put in place so that those belonging to the bottom spectrum would have something to cushion their fall considering that medical expenses is what is costing a lot these days. The money would be coming from small sure-taxes from invested earnings or earned incomes from people who are earning well enough. To them the percentage of tax would be very small but or the people who belong at the bottom half of the economy that would be a huge amount. So how then this situation at hand would be overcome?