Soc-220 Intro to Social Problems Worksheet PDF

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Week 1 social problem worksheet...

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Jessica Meraz Soc-220 October 9, 2020 Mary Carlisle

Impact of Poverty Hunger, illness, poor living conditions and sanitation are all circumstances and causes of poverty. In other words, being poor does not just mean not having sufficient food, it also means not having enough money to afford food or clean water. The impacts of poverty are interdependent and tied together, therefore, it is like a domino effect and one problem causes another. Not having access to clean water makes people vulnerable to disease. The real issue is that people from lower income communities are often targets of discrimination and end up trapped in a cycle of poverty that goes from generation to generation. Sociological imagination allows sociologists to take a look at the bigger picture rather than analyzing individual subjects (Sullivan, 2016). Poverty is influenced by society in many ways. People that are underprivileged are often the victims of discrimination based on economic status and race. It goes hand in hand. Families may not grasp that their children will suffer from inequity in their education due to lack of resources, understaffing, and overcrowded classrooms. The educational system in America has adverse effects on the lower class. Thus, having this information can be a gateway to making changes in the educational system. There is often stigma and shame connected to poverty and deprivation of material items. Structural disparities among students from different class backgrounds start early and run deep. For starters, demographics play a huge role in the quality of education children receive, thus, inequality starts from early on.

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All factors lead up to greater structural advantages for students from high socioeconomic status backgrounds. Students who may not have the proper resources in high school may end up going to a community college, which in general have higher dropout rates, those students may be obligated to work in order to support their families, and federal aid is not nearly enough to support a college student or even supplement their tuition a lot the time. Conflict theory best aligns with the national issue of poverty. Conflict theory states that there is perpetual class conflict in society due to unequal distribution of resources. It focuses on the concept of social inequality in the division of resources and conflict amongst classes. Since all societies maintain forms of injustice, social change is driven by conflict. people are divided into groups like the upper class, middle class, and lower class. This can lead to income and educational disparities, where the rich are set up to succeed and the "poor" have fewer opportunities. Now, of course, social mobility is possible but not can be extremely difficult to do because the same resources are not available to all people. Generally speaking, if someone's parents are wealthy, by default they will be more privileged regardless of work ethic. People are told that everybody is created equal and the same opportunities are available but that is not the case. Things like the Civil Rights Act technically banned segregation and discrimination but people did not oblige so many people of color did not receive the resources that they deserved and that were freely given to others. Black and Hispanic people are faced with poverty in America more than any other group (Wade, 2017)

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References 1.

Sullivan, T. J. (2016). Introduction to social problems (10th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson. Chapter 1

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Wade, O. S. (2017). White Flight and the Endless Cycle of Poverty for Urban People of Color in America. In Online Submission (Vol. 4, Issue 4, pp. 141–145)....