Los derechos del niño en el contexto de la globalización

The United States has an open class system of life chances and opportunities in the market place.

An Open Class System is an economic system that has upward mobility, is

achievement-based, and allows social relations between the classes. India has a closed caste system. A Closed Caste System is an economic system that allows no mobility between caste levels: you are born into the caste you stay in your entire life, and you can't have social relations between the castes. India has a highly structured caste system which has 5 distinct cast layers called: Brahman (Priests or scholars); Kshatriya

(Nobles and warriors); Vaishva (Merchants and skilled artisans); Shudra (Common

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laborers); and Harijan (Outcast/dirty workers).

In India you typically are born into a caste

and that is your destiny for life. This was basically true up until the 1980s when multinational corporations began to set up various types of business enterprises in India. Western corporations hired thousands and thousands based upon their personal skills and achievements (a class trait in the West). The Indians have experienced cultural disruptions because talented individuals have worked their way above higher caste members in the organizational structure. We find similar violations of caste rules here in the US where Indians who migrate here find themselves with many

opportunities. Their life chances increase by virtue of their being able to shift residence from a caste to a class society.

Sociologists like to study how people improve, diminish, or leave unchanged their economic status-we call this Social Mobility means the movement between economic strata in a society's system. There are a few key types of mobility. Upward Mobility means moving from a lower to higher class. Downward Mobility is moving from a higher to a lower class. Horizontal Mobility is remaining in the same class. We can compare mobility between or within generations of family members. Inter-generational Mobility is the research of mobility between generations (IE: grandparents to parents to grandchildren to great-grandchildren).

Just list the occupation your grandparents, parents, and you have and rank them by property, power, and prestige. This is a measure of inter-generational mobility at your personal level. Intra-generational Mobility is the research of mobility within a

generation. Just compare your property, power, and prestige between you and your brothers and sisters (this might even work for comparisons between you and your cousins).

Structural Mobility is mobility in social class, which is attributable to changes in social structure of a society at the larger social, not personal level. The United States has experienced collective upward social mobility for the entire nation over the last 40 plus years. Upward structural mobility can be identified in Figure 3 above as you look at the trends of median household income over the last few decades. On the other hand certain portions of the US society are experiencing more upward mobility than others.

The Congressional Budget office reported that between 1979 and 2007, the US after tax income grew 275 percent for the top 1 percent of the richest people; 65 percent for the next 19 percent richest; 39 percent for the people who feel between the 21-60 percent richest category; then rose only 18 percent for the US’s poorest poor or lowest 20 percent (retrieved 19 June 2014 from Trends in the distribution of household income between 1979-2007 ).

The Middle Class are defined as those between the upper class and poorer class

members of society. This sounds fairly concise and accurate, but there is also a

subjective component to being middle class—your values and aspirations. Many middle class want their children to graduate college build for a retirement, buy a nice home, buy a nice car, and take their family on a few vacations. Surveys find that many

Americans define themselves as belonging to the middle class, even if they have low or higher levels of income (See Cashell, Brian W. "Who are the Middle Class?" CRS Report for Congress. October 22, 2008 and Middle Class in America ).

Many middle class people in the US work toward what many have called, the

"American Dream." USA Today ran an article 4 July 2014 on exactly what that dream might costs (Retrieved 7 August 2014 from What it Cost To Live The American

Dream, by Howard R. Gold, ). The article estimated annual earnings of $58,491 in order to buy the basic family of four dream; another $17,009 to afford a few of the niceties or extras; another $54,857 to pay taxes and put money into retirement and college funds for a total of $130,357 to live the so called, "American dream." Of course most in the US do not come close to earning this much money, but many still strive to be able to.

The US Census Bureau provided Census data between 1967 and 2012 indicating the percent share of the total US wealth obtained by the population and depicted in

quintiles. Quintiles are groups of people in society divided in to 5 distinct subgroups, each representing 20 percent of the population. In this case the quintiles represent the poorest 20 percent; 2nd poorest 20 percent; middle 20 percent; 2nd richest 20 percent;

and richest 20 percent of the US population for each year. Figure 9 shows the share of the total US income obtained by each quintile of the country’s richest on down to poorest 20 percentage groups.

It is obvious that the richest 20 percentile has seen a dramatic rise in the share of the total US wealth obtained since 1969. The lower 4 quintiles or 80 percent have each seen a steady decline over the last 4-5 decades.

Figure 9. Percent of Total US Wealth Obtained by 5 US Quintile Income Groups 1967-2012*

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* retrieved 19 June 2014 from Historical Income Tables: Households, Table H-2. Share of Aggregate Income Received by Each Fifth and Top 5 Percent of Households, All Races: 1967 to 2012

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/income/data/historical/household/ and Excel files in All Races Table H-2. Share of Aggregate Income Received by Each Fifth and Top 5 Percent of Households.

Sociologists who focus on stratification typically use official data to measure the layers.

This is what is called the Objective Method, where researchers set up categories and rank people according to preset objective criteria (such as median household income).

Sociologists also talk to people or ask their opinions about the layers and how they perceive their fit into the economic strata.

The Reputational Method is where researchers look to people who know the individual and subjectively report on his/her class. We ask them to answer a survey question such as "which class best fits your current economic situation? __Rich, __Middle, __Working, or __Poverty Class". Notice the absence of numbers in the reputational method.

Yes, there are layers in society. Through sociology’s theories and statistical style you can begin to better understand how they develop and how they are perpetuated in various forms both within and between countries.

Additional Reading

There is an interesting report on empowering women economically free on the United Nations webpage..

The United Nations set up 8 Millennium goals to reach by 2015 meritocracy

Davis-Moore thesis capitalist

proletarians alienation

blue-collar occupations

Marx means of production and the analysis of class Weber class and status

means of production surplus value

pariah groups status

Davis and Moore functions of stratification Erik Olin Wright contradictory class locations Annette Laureau on parenting styles

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underclass

intergenerational mobility intragenerational mobility exchange mobility

relative poverty working poor

feminization of poverty children in poverty the elderly in poverty homeless

Kuznets curve culture of poverty dependence culture BACK TO TOP

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Introduction to SOCIOLOGY

Ron Hammond, Paul Cheney, Raewyn Pearsey

Chapter 10 - Sex and Gender