Social Stratification: Education and Income

Dakota Hawkins

Stratification Exploration

Stratification is the classification of people within a society into groups, generally depending on socio-economic class. These classifications can lead to a set of inequalities based off of where the group stands on the socio-economic scale. For example, an inequality in education is apparent when you look at the two extremes of the socio-economic scale: individuals in poverty, whom are subject to urban living, will likely receive less of an education than those on the very tip of the socio-economic scale, whom can afford private education and university.

We saw the example of inequalities of education played out for us during “Social Class in America.” The individuals who were stratified into lower, middle, and upper class received varying degrees of education (the least amount obtained from the lower class and respectively increasing). Even though the video was made more than fifty years ago, it was still fairly accurate in regards to varying degrees of education that are open to the different socio-economic classes; however, the video placed a lot more responsibility on the individual; it is the work ethic of the individual that determines successfulness, not social structures. Indeed, this would be inline with the idea of the American Dream: if an individual works hard they will be successful.

While the idea of the American Dream was championed in “Social Class in America,” Dr. Shakur seemed to refute the existence of the American Dream, if not explicitly than at least implicitly. The video opens with footage of a riot. Commentators are remarking how violence is a cause of joblessness, poverty, and hopelessness. If we look back to “Social Class in America” we see the son born on the lowest economic rung received the least education and the lowest paying job. If a low income generally correlates with lower education and a lower education correlates to a lower paying job, a cycle seems to develop: those with low paying jobs will get a worse education, which causes them to receive a low paying job, and the cycle continues. Paired with 2Pac’s observation that the world is “such a gimmie-gimmie-gimmie [place],” and the increase in income inequality in the U.S., the cycle seems to exacerbate itself.

To me, this is where social stratification becomes dangerous: it takes a problem, and substantially worsens it. Because of the inequality in education received by lower economic classes, they are forced to stay within that role. It is not that there is inherent bad or evil in poverty, or rather a person being “bad” for being poor, but the inequalities within stratification forces them into this role with no way to get out. In a society where personal responsibility and work ethic are championed as the causes of success and gauge a person’s worth, there seems to be a societal framework that plays much more of a role than a person’s own personality.