Social Class and Life Chances
Max Weber (1948) defined the term life chances to describe how some members of society had much better opportunities than others to achieve the things in life that most people would see as desirable
These include:
- Live a long and healthy life
- Achieve good educational qualifications and go to higher education
- Fulfilling and well-paid jobs and avoid unemployment
- Own their own home with low risk of crime and access to open spaces and leisure facilities
- Enjoy paid holiday and a range of leisure activates and to appreciate cultural amenities
Life chances were seen as closely linked to personals social class background
Higher a person’s social class, the greater opportunities they had
Modern sociologists point out that other kinds of social inequalities also affect life chances in terms on woman traditionally had worse life chances so they can achieve high-paid and high-status jobs
Social Class Inequalities in Income
Income inequalities are the basis of social class inequalities in a society like UK
Persons income affect their access to a variety of things that may be regarded as desirable in society
Income refers to flow of money a person or household over a period of time
Main sources of income are:
- Earnings from employment or self-employment
- State benefits
- Pensions
- Interest and dividends from savings and investment
Income Statistics
Calculating how incomes are disturbed is not easy
Derived from a number of sources which include the following:
- Family resources survey is a government sponsored survey which provides information on living conditions and resources of households in UK
- Annual survey of hours and earnings provides information about levels, distribution and make up of earnings and hours worked for employees in all industries and occupations
- Based on 1% sample of employee jobs taken from HM revenue and customs pay as you earn records
- British household panel survey is a longitudinal survey
- Began in 1991 and follows same representative sample of individuals over a period of years
Surveys rely on respondents giving accurate data and their incomes there may be reasons why people exaggerate their income
More frequently, people are likely to underestimate their income in official surveys, so they do not declare all of their income for tax purposes where people work cash in hand
Trends in Income Distribution
Income is defined as the flow of money a person or household over a period of time
Britain is one of the most unequal societies in Europe so their incomes and has become more unequal in last 30 years
From 1950s to 1970s there was a slight narrowing of income inequalities but during 1980s, inequalities of income increased sharply during the period of Margaret Thatcher
Government during this period cut rates of income tax for the rich and also cut links between that though benefits increased with inflation, they generally increased faster than prices
While the rise in income inequality slowed down in 1990s, it has increased again
Between 1979 to 1997 income inequality between rich and poor in Britain widened until it was at its most unequal since records began
Functionalists and new right sociologists think that unequal distribution of wealth is good for society as it encourages hard work
Marxist’s sociologists argue that unfair distribution is created by the rich as it is beneficial
Effects of Taxes and Benefits on Income Distribution
Government takes more in taxes from the rich than the poor and gives more to the poor in benefits than the rich
The tax and benefits system are not as redistributive as many people imagine
In 2013 the poorest fifth of the population paid far less tax in cash terms than richest fifth but as a proportion of their income the poorest fifth paid more at 37.4£ of their incomes compared to 35.1%
One reason is through direct taxes fall mostly on the rich, indirect taxes fall mostly on the poor
A poor person buying a litre of petrol pays the same duty as a rich person, but it represents a much larger share of their income
Income of High Earners
Recent years there has been considerable debate about the salaries of bankers and top executives of large companies
Many high earners receive not only very large basic salaries, but also annual bonuses are often several times their annual salary
Critics point out that executives of companies that are performing poorly receive bonuses which are supposedly a reward for high performance
In 2012 the high pay centre reported that the total pay of chief executive of the 100 largest companies on London stock exchange had risen by 49% during the previous year alone compared with average increases of less than 3% of employees
The rise left the chief executives with average pay of £4.2m which was 145 times the average pay of their employees and 162 times the British average wage
Debates about Income Inequality
Sociologists and economists would point to the increase in incomes of almost everyone in UK society over 50 years
The rich got richer and poor are also better off
Alternative view would point to the relative inequality between rich and poor
Incomes of the poor have risen slowly since 1970s while middle incomes have enjoyed larger increase in real terms
Richest members of society have seen the biggest increase of incomes overall
Critics say income is distributed today would argue that we live in an increasingly unjust society as a result
Functionalist and new right thinkers argue that unequal rewards are actually beneficial society as they ensure that those with talent are encouraged to work hard and use their abilities
Argument is often used as a justification for high salaries and bonuses offered to top businesspeople
Argued that unless companies in UK offer large salaries, they will not be able to compete for highly skilled staff with companies in other developed countries in global market
Sociologists influenced by Marxists and Weberian perspectives argue that senior managers and company directors are often in a position to determine their own salaries
It is power that such individuals have within their organisations that allows them to create a culture where huge rewards become norm
Ordinary workers have to bargain their rewards either individually or through trades union and may have little option but to accept whatever wages and other rewards employers are willing to offer
Social Class Inequalities in Wealth
Income is described as a flow as income flows in and out of the pockets of the people or household
Wealth is a stock concept – measures the economic resources and possessions of a person or household at a fixed point in time
Office of National Statistics define:
- Property wealth such as houses and land so housing accounts for 81% of UK
- Physical wealth – cars, jewellery
- Financial wealth – form on money such as bank accounts
- Private pension wealth – cash value of what an individual has accumulated in pension fund
In 2014, 1% of the population owned as much wealth as the poorest 55% according to the ONS
In 2013, Oxfam reported that 5 billionaire families controlled the same wealth as 20% of the population or 12 million people
Sources of Data on Wealth
Bases it estimates of the distribution of wealth on the wealth and asset survey
Merit of being a large-scale national survey backed by the government
2012 the annual Sunday times rich list suggested that the richest 200 families had between them total wealth averaging £225 billion between 2008 and 2010 an average of more £1 billion each
John Hills (2013) suggests that the Sunday times lists is better at capturing business assets but the ONS data probably gives better coverage of assets such as pensions
Problems with Measuring Wealth
Defining what should be counted as wealth is not straightforward
Calculating the value of assets is difficult
Obtaining data about wealth from income can be difficult such as capital gains
Much of the wealth in the form of shares in businesses in the UK is now owned by institutions such as pensions, banks and insurance companies
Evaluation of the Distributions of Wealth
Wealth is more unequally distributed than income in UK
Very difficult to survive in UK today with no income but a large proportion of the population has little or no wealth
Poorest 50% of the population have only 10% of wealth have virtually no wealth at all
People being in a state of negative wealth, such as those with debts that are greater than their assets
The Birmingham Commission Report – Rowlingson and Mullineux (2013)
Wealth inequalities occur in different ways, so some people have higher incomes than others and some choose to accumulate wealth rather than lifetime gifts from parents and some invest in housing and other assets just before increase in value
Wealth affects physical and mental wellbeing as well as education and employment opportunities it Is argued that wealthy people become insulated from the lives of others, leading to a divide between rich and poor
Ability is a potential threat to democratic process
Low levels of income reduce the ability to avoid debt and accumulate savings
Levels of problem debt have been increasing in recent years and look set to increase still further
Those in the middle of the wealth distribution tend to have some housing and pension wealth or the ability to accumulate some
However, there are a number of difficulties facing this group
Those at the top of the income distribution have seen huge increases of their increase in recent decades which have fed through into wealth inequalities
Those in high incomes are also much more likely to receive an inheritance and a lifetime gift and much more likely to receive a high value
Report concludes by arguing the government should consider actions to redistribute wealth, including fairer rewards for work as well as reforms to wealth taxation including an overhaul of council tax and capital gains tax
Are Wealth Inequalities based on Age or Class?
Critics of analysis argue that inequalities of wealth are more related to age than social class
People tend to be accumulated wealth as they get older
Most middle-income earners their major sources of wealth are likely to be their homes and their pensions in both cases the value of these tends to increase as peoples approach retirement
Some extent supported by the Birmingham Commission
Found a clear link between wealth and age so those in 55-64 age group having the highest levels of wealth
However, there is a considerable inequality within this age group the poorest tenth less than £28’000 of wealth on average compared with top tenth who have more than £1.3 million
Reflects the fact that those on higher and middle incomes have much more chance to accumulate wealth than those on lower incomes
Are Wealth Inequalities based on Meritocracy?
Argued that inequalities of wealth represent a meritocracy
So, people with talent and those who save their money or invest prudently are rewarded by building up more wealth
Entrepreneurs such as lord Alan sugar who came from a working-class background and built up a business empire based on his company Amstrad are often cited as an example of people who build up considerable wealth based on their own merits
Research by Tony Atkinsons (2013) reveals that an increasing proportion of national income now comes from inherited wealth, reversing a long-term decline in the importance of inherited wealth going back to 19th century
Before 1st world war, total transmitted wealth represented 20% of national income
Gradually fell to around 10% after 2nd world war and dropped to 5% in late 1970s
Long term trend has been reversed with a rise from 4.8% in 1977 to 8.2% in 2006
Suggests that inequalities of wealth do not simply results from differences in talent between individuals as an increasing proportion simply inherit wealth that their parents accumulated
Education
At all stages of education, students from working class backgrounds achieve less than their middle-class counterparts
Even working-class children have the same level of intelligence as middle-class children they are:
- Less likely to attend a nursey schools and pre-school playgroups
- More likely to start school unable to read
- More likely to fall behind their middle-class peers in reading, writing and maths
- More likely to be placed in lower sets or streams
In 2015, the Sutton trust reported more than one third of bright but disadvantaged boys and just under a quarter of level, but poor girls seriously underachieved at GCSE
Figures compared to 16% of boys and 9% of girls from better off homes
Social Class Inequalities in Work and Employment
Most workplaces there is a hierarchy of occupations with higher-status jobs not only enjoying more pay but also number of other advantages
Inequalities are seen by many sociologists as related to the position of individuals in the labour market
Weberian sociologists more privileged workers tend to be in more skilled and high-status occupation that can command higher levels of pay and other rewards
Workers who are less skilled tend to have significantly less bargaining power or what Weber referred to as a poorer market situation
Functionalists and new right think that social class inequalities in workplace merely reflect the meritocratic nature of modern societies such as UK
People who have worked hard in the educational system to acquire skills and qualifications deserve greater rewards than those who failed to make the most of their education
Marxists argue that inequalities of income and other rewards derive from the need for capitalist employers to keep wages down and profits up
Marxists also suggest that key workers such as managers who run a business enterprise on behalf of their owners are likely to be much more highly rewarded because of the way the act as agents of the ruling class ensuring profitability of businesses of shareholders
They are not social class inequalities in relation to work in terms of basic levels of pay but also in relation to a variety of other types of rewards:
- Financial rewards: compared to senior staff so more routine workers not only earn less pay but less likely to enjoy other perks
- Status so most work, organisation, differences of status reflects differences of income
- Power and control so most senior staff in workplaces often have more autonomy and control in their work, more routine and lower-paid workers are closely supervised
- Opportunities for advancement so in professional and managerial jobs there is often a career ladder, so employees tend to receive training and development so move up position
- Job satisfaction so more skilled workers may achieve higher levels of job satisfaction because they exercise a wider range of skills and can make decisions in their jobs
- Job security as manual workers and other routine workers are much more likely to face job losses and unemployment than more skilled workers
Social Class Inequality in Poverty
Studying poverty focuses our attention on those at the lower end of the income scale on people who often own a little or no wealth
There is no agreement as to what we mean by poverty
This means there is also considerable controversy over the extent of poverty
Child poverty action group argues there are 3.5 million children in poverty in UK
Some conservative Politian’s have denied that poverty still exists in UK
Wilkinson and Pickett (2014) found poverty brings with its various socio-economic disadvantages so higher level for illness and disability, lower life expectancy etc…
Definitions of Poverty
Absolute Poverty
Def. A lack of basic essentials needed to survive physically as these include adequate food, clothing, housing and fuel
Working out what essentials a person needs and how much they cost is complex task and not all researchers would agree where this kind of poverty line should be drawn
A number of researchers such as Jonathan Bradshaw (2008) have attempted to develop a budget standard of poverty
This tries to define a minimum acceptable income by calculating what is needed to afford an acceptable living standard based on a costed of items deemed essential
Critics argued that absolute definitions only allow for a person’s physical needs and take no account of what is needed to participate fully in society
Argued that in UK today being able to take part in leisure activities such as holidays and outings as being able to buy presents for friends and family and having access to a TV or phone are socially necessary by most people through none of these are necessary to physical activities
Relative Poverty
Def. a normal expectation or living standards of a society at a particular time
Sociologists today use relative definition of poverty
Involves judging whether a person’s income so far below that expected by the majority of people in society that they are excluded from normal lifestyle
The problem is agreeing what items should be included as being necessities without which a person should be regarded as being in poverty
Implies that what we define as poverty is not fixed and that poverty line in the UK will be much higher so India because the majority of people have a higher living standard in UK
Critics argue it is impossible to ever eradicate relative poverty as some people will always be worse off than others and therefore arguably in relative poverty
As society change and become more affluent so the idea of what is poverty will change to
If a person or family is unable to achieve a moderate standard of living so suggests they should be defined as poor
Households Below Average Income
No official statistics of poverty in UK
Government does publish statistics on households below average income drawing on data from official surveys such as the family resources survey and the British household panel survey
They define low incomes as being 60% of the median
Criticised for being an arbitrary cut off point
Some critics argue that many people just below that 60% cut off point are not badly off that they should be defined as poor
They show little change in levels of poverty in UK since around 2003
It can be argued that poverty has become more severe since the start of the recession following the banking crisis in 2008
Figures from Trussell trust, a charity that provides food banks to help the poorest families which suggest that in 2014
4.7 million people were in food poverty so had insufficient income to afford a healthy diet so compared a fever than 26’000 in 2008/9
Consensual Measure of Poverty
Joanna Mack and Stuart Lansley (1985) involved asking a series of representative focus groups which of a list of items they regarded as necessities
Items that were rated as necessities by 50 in a list
Researchers then carried out a living standards survey of a sample of the general population asking them about how many of these necessities they had to go without because they could not afford them
Households lacked three or more necessities were counted as poor and those that went without five items were defined as in severe poverty
Approach has been repeated in a number of studies so most recent of study the Impoverishment of the UK
Respondents in each successive survey have tended to include an ever-increasing number of items in list of necessities supporting the view behind relative definition of poverty that we need to constantly revise what we mean by poverty in line with rising expectations
PSE study carried out in 2012 suggest that there has been a major increase in poverty since Mack and Lansley’s original study was published
2012, 33% of households were defined as suffering from multiple deprivation as they lacked three or necessities, compared to 14% in 1983
Social Class Inequalities in Social Mobility
Is the movement of individuals up or down the social scale?
Refers to the movement of people up or down the social scale
Sociologists measure social mobility in two main ways:
- Intergenerational mobility refers to mobility between generations such as son or daughter of a milkman who is objectively categorised as working class may become a teacher = middle class occupation
- Intragenerational mobility refers to movement between classes by an individual during their working life
The UK is supposed to be an open, meritocratic society which means that merit is supposed to be main criteria for upward social mobility rather than social class inequalities
Open and Closed Societies
Research into this is useful as it can tell sociologists a lot about nature of the class structure of a society
There is a great deal of social mobility it suggests we are an open society so a society where there a few obstacles to those with talent rising out of their social class
Sometimes referred to as a meritocracy
A closed society is one where there is little or no social mobility
Feudal system that existed in western Europe in middle ages would be an example
Most individual’s system at the same social rank as their parents such as lords
Problems of Researching Social Mobility
Placed people into social classes based on their occupations and the case of intergenerational mobility the occupations of their parents
Researchers can then study a sample of people to see how many of them have changed their class position and by much
However, there are a number of problems with measuring social mobility
- Classifying occupations
Sociologists do not agree on how people should be classified by occupation
Comparing studies is different researchers have used different classifications
- Studying the mobility of woman
Most older studies of social mobility such as the oxford mobility study focused on mobility of male heads of households only
They focus on men and ignore woman
- Studying the mobility of the very rich and poor
Very wealthiest people in society are not usually clearly identified in social mobility studies as they are often categorised alongside professional and managerial occupations
Arguably top positions are much more closed than those below them as the wealthy often acquire their positions through inheritance
Similarly, poor groups often have no occupations so focusing on the working population may ignore the extent to which they are trapped at the bottom of society
- Studying current patterns of social mobility
Studies of social mobility cannot really draw conclusions about how far people are mobile until they are well established in their careers as this is not usually until they are in 40s and 50s
This means that researchers often studying the impact on social mobility of government policies on education or changes in the labour market that took place 30 or more years ago
Goldthorpe: The Oxford Mobility Study
Undertaken by John Goldthorpe (1980) in 1972 was one of the largest studied a sample of around 10’000 men across 2 generations
Goldthorpe used a hope-Goldthorpe scale to compare the occupational classes of sons and their fathers
The study found in the period after the second world war there has been considerable upward social mobility
Over 2/3s of the service class had started off in either the working class or the service class
Possible explanation for this was the introduction of free secondary education after 1944 and the expansion of opportunities in higher education
They suggested that this was not important as many people believed
Argued that changes in the occupational structure were more significant
Mid 20th century there was a reduction in the sixes of the working class as there were fewer manual jobs as an increase in the size of the service sector
Research points to an increase in absolute social mobility which is an increase in the number of men who ended up in a different class position to their fathers
We compared relative mobility rates as based on the chances of different social classes achieving upward mobility as little changed during the period studied by the OMS
Confirmed 1:2:4 Rule of Relative Hope was still in place
Evaluation of the OMS
The findings were largely confirmed by later studies
Carried a follow up study using 1982 British election survey data which confirmed the continuing expansion of the service class so creating more opportunities for absolute mobility, but relative mobility remained the same
Gordan Marshall (1988) ls found evidence of inequality in relative mobility rates with someone starting off in the service class having 7x as much chance of ending up in the service class as someone from working class
Both had findings and his methodology have been the subject of much criticism from different quarters
Peter Saunders argued that we should focus on absolute rather than relative mobility rates
Argues that the increasing number of working-class children who do well in education and go on to service class jobs should be celebrated
New right thinkers argue that Goldthorpe arguments have a left-wing bias as presenting Britain as a class-ridden closed society rather than highlighting the opportunities presented by capitalism for everyone to achieve
He argues the Goldthorpe makes the mistake by assuming that innate abilities in a form of intelligence is evenly distributed throughout the social classes
Saunders argues that children of the service class are likely to inherit higher levels of intelligence and thus have a better chance of achieving service-class jobs as their ability
Hotly disputed by many other sociologists who would question the idea that intelligence is innate or inborn
Saunders arguments also ignore a range of research pointing ways in which working class children are disadvantaged not by lack of intelligence but by their home backgrounds and unequal opportunities within educational system
Feminists such as Michelle Stanworth (1984) and Pamela Abbot (1990) have criticised studies for focusing exclusively on men
Goldthorpe claimed that there was no need for research on female mobility as in most households’ men were the main wage-earners and most woman took their class positions from husband/father
Feminists they ignore the importance of woman as wage-earners
Abbot also argues that woman’s experiences of mobility are likely to be different from men’s
Goldthorpe’s study focused on mobility into the service class as around 25% of the workforce when he did his research
Focus on the very top positions in UK society
Marxists would point to the fact that many of the super-rich have achieved their positions through inherited wealth
Many top jobs in UK society are still filled by people who were privately educated and opportunity sample usually only available to children of well-off parents
Feminists criticised this as it focused on exclusively on men
Abbot points out that woman are now important wage-earners and a social mobility study is required that acknowledges that disadvantages faced by woman in the workplace
Savage and Egerton: The NCDS Study
A more recent study of social mobility in Britain was undertaken by Mike Savage and Muriel Egerton (1997) and used data from national child development study which was a longitudinal survey of people born in 1958
Study was based on class that people have reached in 1991
It included data on the social mobility of woman
Karl Roberts (2001) adapted data from both the OMS and the NCDS studies in order to analyse changes in social mobility in 20th century
- Working class continued to contract and the intermediate and service classes to expand so this provides opportunities for upward mobility from working class
- Chances of escaping the working class did not increase greatly
- 55% of men originating in the working class stayed in that class
- Chances of working-class men rising to the service class did increase significantly from 16 to 26%
- NCDS study, service class sons were more than twice as likely to end up with service class jobs compared to those from the working class
- In both studies, service class were recruited fairly diverse origins so 40% of working-class backgrounds but 3/4s in both studies came from working class backgrounds
- Woman have different patterns of mobility from men so with more working-class woman likely to move up into intermediate class and service class woman moving down
Lee savage – Snakes and Ladders
Studied people in their 30s throughout the 1990s and compared their progress with another group in 2000s
Positive note was the study found that the chances of someone moving a long way up the earnings ladder had improved by over 20% compared to 1990s
However, the study found little overall mobility
Low earners in both the 1990s and 2000s were likely to remain low earners such as 3% in 1990s significantly improved their earnings and 6% of the 2000s saw an increase in their earnings
Government Policy and the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission
Government recognised the issue of barriers to social mobility in UK by setting up social mobility and child poverty commission in 2010
The commissions criticised the governments in 2013 for failing to do more to tackle issues such as child poverty that hold back the most disadvantaged children
Britain’s remains highly unequal society in terms of social class inequalities
Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett (2009) demonstrates countries with highest levels of income inequality countries have much lower levels of social mobility
Wealthiest European countries have a much lower degree of income inequality than UK and higher mobility rates
UK is much closer to the USA in having low rates of social mobility and high degree of income inequality
If Wilkinson and Pickett are correct the UK is only likely to become a more open society of government can reverse the widening social inequalities of recent years
Social Class Inequalities in other Areas of Social Life
Paper one and 3
Education and health
Education
All stages of education, students from working class backgrounds achieve less than their middle-class counterparts
Private schools educate only 7% of British children so according to research by Sutton trust in 2015, private school pupils make up nearly 3 quarters of the top judiciary
These factors undermine the view that the UK is a meritocracy so a society that rewards people purely on the basis of ability, talent and hard work
Health
Official statistics on morbidity and mortality indicates that if you are from manual or working-class background are more likely to die young and age faster
Over last 25 years, life expectancy has risen for both men and woman all social classes
Overall has not risen more for those in the higher and those in lower social classes has actually increased
Some Marxist’s argue that the health gap is a direct result of the wealth gap caused by the unequal organisation of capitalist society