Social class & life chances essay PDF

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Outline and assess the view that social class still affects life chances in the contemporary uk
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Ellie Smith

Outline and assess the view that social class still affects life chances in the contemporary UK? (40 Marks) Differences in social class still exist in the UK, however different theories have different views on this. Some believe the differences are due to social class, others argue that social class is not the factor as many opportunities exist to ensure life chances are equal. Social inequalities exist in income and wealth, housing, education and health. Statistics show us that there is a clear link between income and wealth and inequalities. Government surveys show us this such as the Labour Force Survey, the Family Resources Survey and the Living Costs and Food Survey. Household income gathered from the Office of National Statistics in 2008/2009 shows that the top quintile has, on average, £40,000 more than the bottom quintile, showing big differences between the poorest and the richest in the UK and since 1979 the gap has been widening. During the Conservative government (1979-1997) it widened significantly and then stabilised over the Labour government (1997-2010) but didn’t decrease. It has been argued by the Institute for Fiscal Studies that the income difference is greater than what it was after the end of the Second World War. According to Social Trends in 2010 the UK has the eighth worst level of inequality compared to other EU countries and Save the Children in 2009 found 13% of children in the UK are living in severe poverty. Further to this The Hills Report in 2010 found that the household wealth of the top 10% of the population is 100 times higher than that of the poorest 10% and they found a link between wealth and life expectancy. Finally social class also affects a child’s readiness to go to school and having a lower social class background can ‘drag them back’ throughout their schooling life and therefore leads to them not getting as good a job as their middle class counterpart. There are also inequalities in housing, the 2010 ONS showed that 92% of social class 1 either owned homes or had a mortgage, compared to 14% for the long term unemployed or those who had never worked in social class 8. Le Grand, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Child Poverty Actions Group point out the effects of poor housing on life chances. Overcrowded, damp and inadequately heated accommodation leads to inequalities such as physical and mental health problems, educational underachievement, reduced life expectancy and social exclusion. One big inequality difference that affects life chances in the contemporary UK today is educational achievement. Statistics show that working class students do worse than their middle class counterparts at every stage of education and this gap is widening year on year. Archer et al found a lot of working class children do not aspire to go to university and the reasons for this links to Bourdieu’s concepts of social capital and cultural capital, whereby they do not know the system or have contacts to help them get in, instead they adopted the style of the street to overcome their sense of worthlessness. Statistics show us that the percentage of 16 year olds gaining 5 A*-Cs at GCSE is much higher for those from social class 1 compared to 6, 7 and 8. There are also inequalities in higher education, 7% of children go to private schools and 45% of these go to Oxbridge, showing us that children who go to private schools have a much better chance at going to one of the best universities. Further to this Feinstein found that inequalities start from a very young age, at the age of 3, children from working class backgrounds are behind their middle class counterparts by 22 months to 42 months. It has also been found that the number of books a child has in their home corresponds with how long they stay in education and whether their parents had been to university. It was found that as few as 20 could have a negative impact and as many as 500 could lengthen a child’s education by three years. Finally material resources have a big impact as well, Hirsch argues that many working class homes are unable to provide the same level of support compared to middle class families. Education is a big factor because statistics show us that those who go to university and

Ellie Smith have a degree do better financially when they are older, due to having a higher qualified job. This means that working class children who are less likely to go to university may not have as good jobs and therefore lower living standards which can in turn affect their health and life chances. Another inequality difference that affects life chances is health. In 1980 the Black Report concluded there was a strong correlation between health and class and this correlation has been supported by Whitehead and Acheson. Bottero argues that the link between health and class is self-evident due to rates of morbidity and mortality are not randomly distributed across the UK, instead they are higher for working class individuals. These all include cancer, infections, coronary heart disease, strokes and accidents. Wilkinson and Pickett also notice this as life expectancy is 78 for men in middle class areas and 76 for men in poor areas and according to the National Audit Office in 2010 the gap for women is three years. Further to this, infant mortality is 50% worse in the north (Leeds) than in the south (Dorset). Finally Marmot found people near the bottom of the hierarchy had the worse self-reported ill health, suffered greater stress and had higher levels of high blood pressure and depression than those at the top. He then pointed out a ‘health gradient’ which states the lower down the hierarchy you are, the worse your health is. However functionalists argue that inequalities have a purpose and are functional for society, as well as being in all societies and inevitable and necessary. Durkheim argues that society needs specialists to undertake the various jobs and roles required to make it run smoothly and this harmony can only be achieved by a division of labour, where people have different jobs with different skill sets and levels. He also believes that people would accept this as long as they can see the system was working and most importantly was fair. If conflict did occur then he states this would be controlled by socialisation, through sharing values from one generation to another and these would be shared through education, the family and religion. Parsons then developed Durkheim’s ideas and went on to say that in industrialised societies stratification exists on the basis of roles being agreed as the most important for society and the most functional, however this stratification is inequality. He also notes that by sharing the norms and values of society the agreement can occur. Furthermore Parsons believes that the value consensus is what holds society together and gives social order as well as giving individuals a sense of purpose and a commitment to the maintenance of society. Finally he also states that some roles are more suited to men and women, for example expressive roles are more suited to women. Other functionalists; Davis and Moore argue that society needs the most talented people to perform the most skilled jobs and thus have to pay them accordingly and give them a high status. They also argue that society is meritocratic and the most able will be allocated the most important jobs through the use of the examination system. They further believe that the examination system is legitimate because it will ‘sift and sort’ people into appropriate job roles. The stratification, inequalities that exist will ensure the people at the top work hard to stay at the top and the people at the bottom try to improve and better their current position. However Marxists disagree with this and Karl Marx argues that economic forces shape society. They point out that a few wealthy people own the means of production while the rest only own their labour power, this cause’s class conflict between the bourgeoisie and proletariat due to the major class divisions. One major view Marxists have is that the bourgeoisie exploit and oppress the working class through low wages and long hours and argue that although the proletariats are high in numbers compared to the bourgeoisie, they don’t have much bargaining power due to not owning any land or means of production. Marxists argue that order and stability exist in society due to the ruling class who exercise power over the lower groups through the government they elected in. The government then acts on behalf of the bourgeoisie and implements laws that protects them and their land. Another big argument Marxists point out is that capitalism exists because people don’t realise the

Ellie Smith inequalities around them and instead think the system is fair and just, this is called false class consciousness. One way the ruling class persuade people inequalities are fair is through religion and the promise that their afterlife will be good if they do not question the system now. Bowles and Gintis focus on how education is unfair as they argue students’ experience of schooling is an alienating one. This is because school prepares students for their future as workers in a capitalist system so teaches obedience and not the question the class structure. They argue schools prepare students based on their future role in society, so they do not push working class children to do well in education or go to university. A final Marxist called Braverman argues that inequalities in the workplace are exacerbated by certain factors. One factor being the de-skilling of white collar jobs which have in turn become proletarianized due to technology. He also argues that this has happened to other professions as well, such as teachers because they are regularly inspected and told what to teach and when. The problem with de-skilling is that is leads to a loss of bargaining power for the workers and then leads to a loss of earnings. Marxists explanations have been criticised by the New Right and functionalists who argue that the bourgeoisie are not a united class and Postmodernists argue that class is now dead and that people make their own lifestyle choices now instead of being controlled by the ruling class. Further to this feminists point out that they ignore gender inequalities women experience which is just as big a problem as capitalism. Finally it is argued that some people do have class consciousness and know too well that they are being exploited. Neo-Marxist Bourdieu argues that inequalities with class are reproduced through the education system which values the cultural capital of the middle classes. The middle classes impose their habitus on the system which gives their children an advantage, they also have high economic capital due to their academic success. Finally Bourdieu also notes that middle class parents use their cultural capital to surround their children with the ‘right’ influential people in the education system and job market. Weberianism is slightly different to Marxism, Weber argued that stratification is not just based on the economic relationships people enter into, but the status a person has and the political influence or power a person may have, however he agrees with Marxism in the fact that class is the main factor of poorer life chances and inequality. Weberians believe that a person’s class is based on what they can bring to the ‘marketplace’ and the people who own the most marketable resources such as skills, education and income, will be able to acquire more income and access to life chances. For example, parents with a good income can move house to a catchment area of a good school to give their children a better life chance through education. Weberians argue that people are in the same class if they have the opportunity to obtain the same advantages as others in that class. The second factor Weberianism sees as affecting life chances is status, which is based on a person’s social position, on their prestige or social standing. Status is the perception of others and what society deems as being of high standing, so is socially constructed. Some occupations have high status whereas others in the same class may have less status and more economic capital. Crompton argues that the British ruling class work to preserve their market position and tend to socialise with those who consider to have the same status. Finally women and minority ethnic groups often have lower status than white males of the same class. The third factor Weberians see as affecting life chances is party, these are groups or organisations such as political parties or trade unions where people compete for more power or influence those with it, for example campaigning for a pay rise. The more power a person has the more life chances they will be able to assess.

Ellie Smith However Post Modernists argue that because society is becoming characterised by uncertainty and diversity it cannot be explained by old grand theories such as functionalism and Marxism. They believe that people do not see themselves in class terms, instead they construct their identity through the media and what they consume. To them the key to inequalities lies in the development of the post-industrial world and the fact that production of knowledge has taken precedence over manufacturing. Waters argues that people are enticed by advertising to conspicuously consume and buy the image they want to portray meaning we have choice. Post Modernists believe inequality is about the different lifestyle choices people make and not their relationship to the old economic divisions of class. Pakulski and Waters then go on to say that to be middle class in the 21st century for some people might be the kind of property they live in or the holidays they take and for other people whether they wear designer clothes, class nowadays is not as clear as how Marxists describe it. Sociologists such as Giddens and Diamond have become known as the ‘new egalitarians’. They suggest that Britain is a fair and open society in which all social groups are given the potential to unlock their talents and to realise material rewards. However, sociologists such as Roberts, Bottero and Young and research organisations such as the Sutton Trust who are ‘new traditionalists’, suggest that Britain is still a class society in which social background and structural inequalities in income, wealth, power, education and health mean that working class people rarely have their talents unlocked and, consequently, experience great inequality in material rewards and life chances. In conclusion, differences in life chances of working class and middle class groups still exist and could be getting worse due to the gap between rich and poor widening. This is because new mega rich people exist today with a growing number of underclass people, who live on state benefits. Statistics still show that working class people have a lower life expectancy than middle and upper class people due to possible poorer education which leads to a less well-paying job and in turn can lead to health problems....