Is Inequality Meritocratic? Meritocracy is where social positions are filled according to an individual’s merit. Merit often refers to an individual’s talents, abilities, effort and choices that are seen to be either in high demand or deemed worthy. Around the world, many countries believe that societies should enable people to have equal chances to develop their potential. This was built on the idea of human dignity or respect for people which slowly unfolded with the liberal revolutions in Britain.
I think the best step forward would be to, on a national scale, adjust living standards downward. Government, corporations, small businesses, families and individuals are living and doing business above their means. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.”[1] I regularly hear businesses and individuals seeking loans to pay debt. Is this not an oxymoron? Does this not create more debt?
Weber believed it was linked to the type of job people could get, Weber thought differently to Marx about this, as marx believed it was due to owning factories or other resources, and weber thought it was due to skills and qualifications. Weber’s idea of class influenced the ideas of other sociologists, such as goldthorpe (1980). Goldthorpe derived a stratification scale which includes the Weberian concept of market position. This was felt by sociologists to be a more accurate technique of studying stratification, as a pose to just studying peoples jobs. Weber was skeptical about the possibility of the working class bonding together for revolutionary purposes, for example becoming class-conscious because of differences in status would always undermine any common cause.
Who benefits from stratification? Who suffers because of stratification? I think it's good because then people are classed into different social groups so then people with bills etc. Table 1 gives the prestige rankings for a number of different occupations. Do you think that the prestige rankings reflect the most important jobs in society?
Thirdly the family acts as a comfort for the stresses and frustrations of working class men they are there to ‘Cushion the main provider’. Lastly the family as a unit of consumption buys the goods and services provided by capitalism. These functions benefit the minority in power, the bourgeoisie, and the economy. The functions disadvantage the working class society, the proletariat. One way the family serves capitalism is the socialisation of the young into the ruling class ideology.
He wished for the government to step in and take control. With the government to influence the economy, inflation would be suppressed, interest rates would be kept low, and everyone would be happy - or so Woodsworth claimed. Not only would the government control formerly privatized banks, they would also implement policies such as unemployment insurance, welfare, pension, and compensation. This plan relied heavily on a 'trustworthy' government, since all economic matters would be taken care of by the current political party in rule. If the government was 'corrupt', or if they didn't put enough attention on issues of concern, once again, the country would be in trouble.
If this persist long enough it can cause people to revolt against their government and can lead into wars. Other effects of hyperinflation are the relocation of wealth from the public to the government. Once people lose faith in the value of money they will begin to trade goods and services instead of directly purchasing good and services with the country’s currency. During this time interest rates will lower, which will reduce the value of money even more. To stop hyperinflation a government needs to restore confidence in the countries budget system and balance their budget.
Social position reflects personal talents and abilities in a competitive economy. Unequal rewards boost economic production by encouraging people to work harder and try new ideas. Linking greater rewards to more important work is widely accepted. The social-conflict approach also looks the problem from a macro level of analysis. Stratification is a division of a society’s resources that benefits some people and harms others.
Not only does the ability& training plays a part the education of one person can allow them to be paid more than an individual with a lower status of education. Discrimination is a huge contribution to income inequality because of people gender, race and age will determine a lot on what job than can be hired for and which job performance will suit the company. Incomes maybe established with different kind of individuals, and the intensity of inequality as well as the purpose for inequality will depend on the circumstance of the groups being compared. Incomes can be compared in many ways within a company or organizations and with diverse economies. The disparities of income between genders, race and social status can allow the opportunity of group forming.
The services provided by welfare states differ from country to country, some have highly developed systems than others (Giddens, 2009). In most societies, poverty and social exclusion at the bottom are alleviated by the welfare states. This essay is therefore going to discuss how these welfare states use ideological state apparatus to secure legitimacy of continued inequalities in capitalist societies. Ideology can be defined as shared ideas or beliefs which serve to justify the interests of dominant groups” Giddens (1997:583). Its relationship to power is that it legitimizes the differential power that groups hold and as such it distorts the real situation that people find themselves in.