Social Class In America By Mantsios

Mantsios believes that people in the United States do not like to talk about classes, whether it is upper class, middle class, or lower class. He outlines four beliefs that are widely held about class in the United States, and then thoroughly refutes them with statistical evidence. He argues that the class

Last class we watched an informative documentary named “People like Us, Social Class in America”. America is known to be a country defined by class. Throughout the movie it showed different opinions on what class was based on by different people and the answers varied from looks, house size, career choice, race, manners, upbringing, and education. As we move through life, most times we remove ourselves from different people not in our class to then live amongst those who share similar backgrounds and who we are most comfortable with. As stated, “if there is class, there is an inequality one cannot explain and it perpetuates itself”. Revealing class can expose hope, fears, prejudice and a myriad of different emotions that we may not all be comfortable speaking about. I feel as if part two and part three were most applicable to myself because they are something that I have experienced both directly and indirectly.

After reading Michael Zweig's “The Working Class Majority: America's Best Kept Secret”, I read and was able to determine his own perspective of class. Zweig says that the United States is not a middle class society and that the majority of Americans today are part of the working class. He defines class as power, power in the workplace, cultural, economic, and political and in the larger society and not so much the income. I think he defines class as power due to the fact that we as people have the power to experience class in many ways. We are all born and raised differently and all come from cultural backgrounds. He briefly explains how there is a high class and low class depending how you were raised. I can agree with him on that statement to an extent personally due to the fact that sometimes the worst parents in the universe can raise you, but you alone can show yourself a thing or two about morals and life lessons simply by living them. That does not mean that your parents don’t play a

Classes in the United States have more to do with one’s personal income, educational attainment and occupational prestige for those of different ages. Although there are many people in the United States who believe that American society has been divided into three groups of people poor, middle class and rich, this society is more diverse culturally and economically. While some may believe that because of such diversity it is impossible to draw a distinctive lines between social classes in the world, but there are some who think it will be helpful if we conduct major classes to debate about class matters and to understand it better.

It is believed that there is a tension between social classes in America. Typically, people of lower classes choose to imitate those of higher social status. As a result, advertisers have a tendency to take advantage of this tension in order to profit from people of the lower and middle classes. In "The American Upper Class," G. William Domhoff says that "exhibiting high social status… is a way of exercising power" (Domhoff p.34)," which is something important to all social classes. According to Judi Puritz Cook, author of "Consumer Culture…Sales Discourse," advertisements in print as well as in visual media seem to create "the promise of status mobility through consumption (Cook p.373)." In the article, Puritz explains how television

In America a person or group who is consider to have power are those who produce own land, own business and produce money to America and yet receives all the reources for example the class power. Class power is known for its firm decision making to the middle class and none for the lower class. There authority in which only want the best for themselves instead of multiplying wealth to the lower class by controlling society unqueal contribution. Through the use of this power this group are in control of resources an important help for the society agency in the most needed community. " Unequal distribution of societal power is to a large extent responsible for poverty, hunger, the destruction of nature, and inhuman living conditions. From the

Class has changed in the way Americans understand class. The upper class was seen as people who vacationed in Europe and worshiped God. The middle class drove Fords and enlisted as company men. The working class voted as Democratic and didn’t take cruises. Now, it’s harder for Americans to tell what social class people are in. It’s harder to guess peoples class based on clothing, votes, religion, the cars they drive, and the color of skin. Health and in some cases education is getting harder to tell class with financial help.

The United States currently runs on using the class system for society. This system has many beneficial factors that keeps the U.S. going, but there are also certain aspects of it that should be changed to create a more balanced and fair system overall. One issue with the class system that affects social stratification in America is that there is too large of a economic gap between the middle and upper class. Another issue is that the current system isn’t offering enough reward to people filling in the much needed jobs such as being a teacher, and instead is offering ridiculous amounts of rewards to unnecessary jobs such as a professional player or celebrity. Another issue is that the people in the upper class, especially the top 1%, aren’t being taxed enough to cover for some of the expenses of the government.

Class systems in America are based on wealth and opportunities. It is also somewhat hard to move up from one class to another, however it isn’t impossible. To start, there are three main classes in the US. They are the upper, middle, and lower class. The upper class consists of the top one percent while the middle encompasses the majority of the population. The lower class consists of families with low income and little financial security. The riches are definitely not equally spread in the US. Wealth affects which class you are in. The amount of wealth that a person has is determined by education, occupation, and income. When someone has a college degree they have more job opportunities, and a better job leads to more income. People who don’t

Have you ever seen yourself “above” or better off than someone else? Of course you have, we all have. It could have been that homeless man on the street you saw while driving home, or even a student that you had to tutor because you just seem to understand the concept a little better than they did. That doesn’t make you a bad person does it? I mean someone has to be in charge and someone has to follow. Many of people believe this concept for different reasons. In America, many people think this about their social class. The more money you make, the higher in rank you are in your social class, which could mean the more opportunities you can be a part of or even more doors than can be open to you. Many believe that we still believe in the “necessary

People in America hate to talk about social class, and part of the reason for this is that they rarely even interact with people who belong to other social classes. One recent study found that “…the growth in income inequality from 1970 to 2000 affected patterns of income segregation along three dimensions: the spatial segregation of poverty and affluence, race- specific patterns of income segregation, and the geographic scale of income segregation” (Reardon & Bischoff, 2011, p. 1092). This means that the more incomes stratify, the less people

The definition of Classism is prejudice against or in favor of people belonging to a particular social class. If someone is rich people might think that they are rich because of their parents; however, they might have worked their butts of to get to that point. This quote by David Anderson proves my point “We attended good schools because we studied hard. We’re not legacies: Nobody else in our families attended an Ivy League school. If you met us 20 years ago, you would have seen two 25-year-olds with no money, swimming in student loans in a roach-infested studio apartment in Manhattan” (Anderson). There is also another side to the wall, people might think that people in poverty are not educated, did not use their opportunities, or they did

In America class is not often spoken about. It remains present like the elephant in the room that no one mentions. Despite not being discussed, it still plays an important role in daily lives. Many choose to not speak of the social class they associate with. Social class defines personality and interferes with how others view a person. All social classes come with a perceived image. People create social class based off of what they observe, which is why physical characteristics and choice of lifestyle are the most essential markers of class.

In various societies across the globe, culture is normally seen as an enabling or limiting factor for social, political and economic progression. Through this understanding it has been established that there is a strong relationship between class and culture. This relationship has been previously investigated by researchers such as Pierre Bourdieu who identified that class affects culture and consequently, culture affects ones life chances, income and other economic parameters (Lane 2000, p. 1). Many other researchers have often voiced their concerns over the increased gap between the rich and the poor (worldwide) and expressed their concern over the fact that the world has failed to acknowledge the role of culture in

I live with two blue collar parents who support my two retired grandparents, a 17 and 15 year old and two pets. My parents work decent jobs, but sometimes they struggle to make ends meat. Now that I’m a senior they do their best to give the opportunities and experience that come with senior year. However, I don’t qualify for the free or reduced lunch program unlike my best friend. I never thought of it as a big deal until my sophomore year when my AP Spanish teacher told my class to apply in case we qualify for a discount on the AP test. It was then that I realized that if you have access to this program you have the opportunity to get discounted SATs, ACTs, AP test, and even some college applications. This was the night I realized that I don't have equal access to a higher education unlike some of my friends. Because of this I’ve adapted to being more selective of how I spend my money on my education and I’ve learned that students aren’t given equal opportunities to succeed in an environment where bachelor's degrees are the new high school