Race, Gender, And Social Class

1. Describe the difference between race and ethnicity. What roles do race and social class continue to play in the United States?

Welfare reform is viewed by many as an attack on poor, single mothers. According to Rebecca Blank, “single-mother families are the largest (and fastest-growing) family type.” They also make up nearly all of the families who receive welfare (only 7% of welfare recipients live in two-parent households and even fewer welfare households are headed by men, according to Hays.) Hays also notes in the book that these single mothers are frequently derided as lazy, promiscuous, and are accused of abusing the welfare system for their ill-gotten gains (which in most cases total the princely sum of less than $500 per month.)

Sharon Hays argues that welfare reform policymakers were legislating moral prescriptions for women in poverty who were to take on Welfare aid. I think it could be argued that moral prescriptions on the lives of Welfare recipients was purposeful. Politicians felt Welfare needed to change and help recipients become more self-sufficient over time. This would save money as time went on but would also be a measure of success if less people were on Welfare as time went on. To make Welfare more temporary, inefficiencies had to be addressed and solved. Welfare legislators decided to put the inefficiencies and prescriptions on the recipients themselves and not take into account any other barriers that could be preventing poor individuals and

The Welfare Reform Act of 1996 was enacted in order to change the current welfare policy at the time. This welfare policy that existed was originally meant to provide financial assistance as well as decent healthcare coverage during times of economic hardship (Kaestner, 2004). This policy was implemented as a way to help hundreds of thousands of families overcome financial hurdles. However, the idea behind the reforming of welfare was to avoid the stereotypical individuals that lived off of welfare to continue doing so. Evidence existed that concluded that people who lived off of government welfare assistance were actually allowing this system to destroy their desire to work and sustain themselves (Rector & Marshall, 2013). Welfare was seen as a detrimental part of the government and it was viewed as feeding into a lazy and poorly disciplined class of individuals. Welfare's initial intention was to aid widows who had children to support, but in a matter of decades the entire welfare system converted from being a safety net for individuals in dire times of need, to a support system for able-bodied men who lacked motivation to find employment and sustain themselves and their families (Rector & Marshall, 2013). The Welfare Reform Act came as a way to remedy these problems. Stipulations were put on those applying to receive welfare benefits. Limits were enacted that would reduce the amount of time that people could receive the benefits in order to speed up their

Imagine a world where ones social status won’t determine the outcome of their educational enrichment, a child’s health care prosperities, or even career opportunities. Through years of capitalist modification, society has determined levels of social stratification. What if there was a way to decrease the judgement of welfare participants, decrease welfare payments and increase our economic stand point without removing benefits from needy families?

While welfare reform did benefit many people, welfare reform ended up costing the government more in "tax credits, food stamps, and Medicaid," according to CBO (Washington Post). This was essentially welfare all over again wrapped in a less conspicuous packaging. Moreover, most families in poverty do not receive welfare. Just a little above 23 percent of all families with children living in poverty receive aid, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. This is because of the strict policies and hidden limitations that the new reform set. Education and training were required to get a mandatory job which then allowed for one to receive welfare. Also committing a crime would void welfare, even if it was done to feed one's family according to the article, Picture this: Images and Realities in Welfare to Work (italicize), by Olson, Muhammad, Rodgers, and Karim. The reality is that many of the ads for the new welfare system were "misleading...[as many realized] that they would need education and training to get jobs that would allow them to support their families" (Karim). It was like asking someone to commit to two things separately in separate places. It was almost impossible to keep track of one's family and train and go to school at the same time. Hence, about 67% of families in poverty did not receive welfare. In fact, most of the job opportunities that were shown did not "pay enough to really

By making improvements to the Welfare System in America has become a way of life that has entrapped so many single and married households across the country. Statistics show that there were 108,592,000 people who are recipients of one or more means of the government benefit programs. The Census Bureau recorded by surveys over 101, 716,000 people who worked full time year around in 2011 which only allowed one member of the family to work year round. The system is meant to help low income families, however; they don’t want to be not allowed to grow by becoming more independent and have opportunities to rise above poverty. The quest to change the welfare system is to ensure the welfare and the rights of children, their parents and

Race and gender are two important terms in society that define us. However, they lead to inequality among individuals. "Race is a socially defined category based on real or perceived biological differences between groups of people" (Ferris and Stein 216). It is based off our biological makeup that distinct us from others (Ferris and Stein). Many people do not know the actual term of race, how deeply rooted it is, or where it derived from, but it all works in one form. Race goes a long way from how you may appear to someone. Just because someone looks a certain race does not mean they will not have inevitably biological material from other races. It is very diverse between many different populations. Race does not identify who you are but what social category you are from. Gender is how you physically appear in society. "Gender is the physical, behavior, and personality traits that a group considers to be normal, natural, right, and good for its male and female members" (Ferris and Stein 243). It is the identity of masculine and feminine. Gender identifies who we are and it reflects deeply on a person's personality. They normally change over time from the assigned sex given at birth. Society has its way of discriminating between race and gender and it shows differences distributed among individuals.

Social stratification involves various inequalities within a gender, race, class. When considering the role of gender, race, and class in the social stratification system, it affects the organization system which is known for disparity based on the families’ income statutes, lack of resources, organization activity, and systematic inadequate government law. In the following essay I will focus how social stratification inequality effect families and individuals in the United States based on a gender, race, and class. Society has lived over decades experiencing different types of inequality. For example, gender inequality has been around since our ancestors. Informing society and continuous advocating about inequality is vital for positives changes

Throughout the semester, we have discussed many different social justice issues. One issue that has stuck with me is gender and racial inequality. Gender inequality is very important to me because I was raised by a single mother and surrounded by women all the time. I do not believe that anyone should be payed or treated differently due to their gender. While growing up, I saw that women are capable for doing anything and often times have to work harder than men to prove themselves. Racial inequality is an issues that is important to me because I feel that all individuals should be equal. I think Dr. King’s idea of color blindness, not today’s definition, should be something that we as a society strive for. We need to move past the idea that

Welfare should not be reformed because it helps single parents. 40 percent of single mothers are poor, 12 million single parents-mother-headed families are poor (Freeman). Welfare can help keep these single parent families stay stable to be an effective families. 12 million single parents mothers headed families can be reduced to less underachieving families with the assistants of welfare. Also with single parents they never had an significant other.

The intentions of welfare reform is simply to reduce dependency, reduce child poverty, and to strengthen marriages (in line citation website). However, taking away a low income families chance for help is not going to help their poverty. The idea of getting rid of the help a family needs, in order to help the family end their poverty is contradictory. This is more likely to leave families stuck in poverty, or even send them below if their aid gets removed.

Race, to many people is one thing and one thing only; the color of one's skin. But race is more than just the color of one’s skin, but it’s their biological makeup and social makeup. Biological race is the skin color we are born with along with the other genetic traits that come with certain ethnic backgrounds. Social race, however, is how society depicts your skin color and biological traits, and decides from there what social “class” you may be placed in, how you’ll be treated, and how you’ll live your life, socially. All people are biologically born the same “race” as their parents, or a mix, if the parents are different. But what determines the social race?

This essay will be discussing the extent to which social class and poverty affects health and illness. Firstly, what is social class? Each person’s perception of social class can be different; is social class defined by a person’s accent, the area they live in, or something as simple as their income? Project Britain describes social class as “The grouping of people by occupations and lifestyle”. (Cress, 2014). To find social class Sociologists group people according to common factors, they compare people and various criteria can be conveniently used to place people in social groups or classes. Next we ask the question what determines a person’s health, the NHS defines health as “Physical and mental, it is the absence of disease”. (NHS 2017).

How you do in school, your social ability, and your awareness of others are all guided by how you identify. Identification in one’s gender, race, religion, social class, and ethnicity are all driving forces behind your future self. Identity is a crucial part of who you are, and in recent studies and experimentation researchers have been trying to identify new, untested factors that influence behavior in people. Although, in the past there hasn’t been a strong focus on the positive and negative effects of race and ethnicity, the conversation is now shifting to align itself with the current times. With America becoming increasingly more ethnically and racially diverse, we must take the time to see how certain factors, specifically race and ethnicity, impact a person’s development and behavior.