America Faces A Wealth Gap

Through this recent recession the gap for financial aid has become increasingly large due to the fact that colleges are basing some of their applications by their financial situation. This in turn creates widening on lower to middle class families who cannot send their children to school because the cost are too great to bear with large amounts of financial aid. The wealthy students are not only being accepted to these pricy private universities but are being given grant and aid so that they can make it through. The poorer students are not even given the chance to attend those school not because of their brain but because of their lack of funding. In today’s society were the upper class has become very distant to the middle and

The wealth gap, or wealth inequality, is known as the unequal distribution of assets within a population. The wealth gap in America between the lower and upper classes is rising exponentially. This imbalance within the distribution of wealth leaves those who aren’t as financially stable to struggle to achieve the same standard of education, and overall living necessities, such as housing, as those who’s wealth persistently grows. The rising wealth gap plaguing American society is bringing those of the lower and middle classes to a set disadvantage point compared to those who have an affluent amount of money. Although this inequality is contributing to an emergent opportunity gap, a solution can arise through new legislation concerning financial

Income inequality is the unspoken truth of American life. Millions of Americans live in poverty while the minority holds the majority of the wealth. This problem has become more severe in recent years, with the wealth gap increasing exponentially. While innovation drives economics in the free market, recent innovations have caused the wealth gap to become skewed. Broadband Internet is one particular innovation that has spurred economic growth but has hurt the lower class. Broadband Internet can be defined as “768 Kbps download and 200 Kbps upload” (Dunbar). Although there are many varying classification of broadband Internet, this definition will be utilized for the purposes of this paper. The non-adoption of broadband Internet by those living

The wealth gap in the United States is way off compared to what people may think it is or what they would like it to be. I’m actually very shocked of what I found. If we divide the entire United States in five different groups, you can say the first group is the poor, the second is the middle class, third and fourth are even progressively richer and the fifth group is the richest. Personally I would say maybe 40 to 50 percent of Americans are poor. They probably make nothing to twenty thousand a year. The middle class is probably 20 percent of American and they make about 30 to 70 thousand a year. The rest, which are the rich and the richer, makes everything else. My perception of the wealth gap was pretty close to what most Americans think.

The three consequences that are education, health and security are three results of the wealth gap American can try to stop them from growing more. However, there are four solutions can decrease this inequality. Those solutions should the government do it to eliminate the gap to be high. The first solution, the government should invest more money in food and health. For instance, the government can support the farms by giving them money to reduce the cost to be available for all people. The second solution is the government should try to decrease the cost living by taking some actions such as force the wealth people to invest more money to help the poor by investing more in the United States. Building factories, companies and organization can

America has transitioned from the land of unconditional opportunity to the land of predetermined success. However, this can’t be a surprise with by “2000, the top 1 percent of households holding more wealth than the entire bottom 95 percent” (Draut 21). This fact is still true today, with the top 1% holding, “35.6% of all private wealth” ("Facts and Figures in 99 to 1). Now the impact this has is, with attending college being the route to wealth more than ever, prosperity in United States is becoming a game only the privileged can play. “Nearly three quarters of students at the nation’s top 146 colleges come from families in the top quarter of the socioeconomic status (SES) scale” (Draut 48), leaving millions of Americans from reaching their full potential. It goes beyond race, even though lineage and class have a huge correlation. The fact that if you don’t have money in the United States from birth, your opportunities are significantly limited. This is proved with only 3% of freshman from the bottom quarter income bracket going to the top colleges (Colleges, American Association Of Community). A large reason for this is the fact that government funding for students college education has largely decreased with student loans/debt being more prominent. Added to this is the fact that many minority communities are still living with the repercussions of America’s white prejudice past.

Our economy has been on a roller coaster going down, but many people seem to believe education can solve our problems. In “A Matter of Degrees”, written by Clive Crook, there are many key points as to why college is not a cure-all. Crook mentions, “To rest the case for improving schools and colleges largely on economic grounds is a mistake” (25). There are many reasons as to why education needs to improve, but one of the most important is that tuition is too expensive for many families who are in poverty. According to Families USA, in an article about income, the poverty line sits at 20,160 dollars (USA 1).

As unskilled jobs become more unreliable to support families, it has become increasingly clear that the path to success in America lies with education. A majority of Americans now believe that a college education is necessary for their children, which can be contrasted with most

The affluent become educated because it is expected of them in order to maintain their wealth and power. However, those who come from blue-collared families are uninspired by both their milieus and the normalities placed by the American government concerning education. The set of standards the government goes by currently doesn’t allow for academic growth, especially when concerning children who are attending

In the United States today, college costs have grown faster than prices in other categories, the tuition growth has outpaced overall price growth in recent years. Many colleges raise tuition because they are uninhibited by the normal economic forces. Additionally, the higher education institutions have few reasons to keep costs low to attract more students. Thus young adults face high cost increases without necessarily improving the quality of education. Subsequently, families suffer hardships on paying the college fees and undergo the many burdens.

The wealth gap, which has two causes in the United States and the effects of, should Americans deal with it as soon as possible. The solutions can be helpful to decrease this problem to be massive. The Americans are trying to do that and the people are wailing to do more for the society. However, the wealth gap became a huge, but the government and people can solve it by the time. This is a global issue like what are happing now in Greece and European counters. If Americans will not do any serous action to stop that, they might face the same result. The countries around the world should put their hand together to solve it by supporting each other once they do it maybe we will stop it.

Wright suggests that the link between education and income creates inequality in America because the institutional setting of education is not balanced. “Education is an unbalanced institution, aligned with the values and aims of the middle class and this alignment alienates people of other classes, forcing them to play catch up to the dominant group” (1369). In 2004, 77% of graduates with bachelor’s degrees or more grew up in middle class or upper class households and 64 % of middle class or upper class households were white. (The Washington Post).

The difference in economic levels between the lower income and the higher income has increased over the years. Therefore, the American Dream is becoming more unobtainable as the inequality increases. Poor income high school students with high entrance exam scores are opting for places such as community colleges instead of higher ranking schools. Since well-off people are marrying people just as well-off, they have the resources to support their kids with time and money. Those whom were raised in the upper class are likely to stay there as they have more support from their parent along with money to invest in their future. Low-income parents tend to be less involved with their children’s education, as they are trying to pay the bills. Some of

In this article, Cruz explores the role of education and how it can improve the mobility of the economy. More specifically, he examines the economic inequalities in the United States, noting about 40% of Americans only take home about 11.8 percent of their earnings. This information connected the importance to a college education and the need to increase the number of college graduates. Cruz concludes that the only way to decrease income inequality in America is to improve higher education and increase attainability for all individuals. On the contrary, this article appeared to provide subjective and bias information because it focused highly on relaying the importance on inaction not being an option for institutions and governing agencies.

The ability to receive an education is often taken for granted in the United States. Unfortunately, many Americans do not have a choice regarding how and where they are educated. However, many people in America have the opportunity to receive a college education, not only from a state school, but a private school or institution. In the chapter “Why the Rich Are Getting Richer and the Poor, Poorer” selected from his 1991 book entitled The Work of Nations: Preparing Ourselves for 21st-Century Capitalism, author Robert B. Reich explains the widening gap between wealthy and poor Americans (p. 179). While Reich describes the trends of three different types of workers to prove his claim: production workers, the service sector workers, and symbolic analysts, these workers each had different opportunities regarding how they were educated. The theory that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer can be clearly proven by analyzing educational and financial opportunities.