1. Unit 5 Social Class Essential Questions: What is social class?
Can you tell the difference between social classes?
Is the American Dream myth valid?
How does economic class affect life in America?

2. Social Class

3. Social Class
a group of people who share the same economic and cultural level

4. Class Household Income % of pop. Capitalist Class: +$500,000 1%
Investors, heirs, and top executives
Private schools, prestigious universities
Many philanthropic (guilt or purpose for life)
Do not fear taxes or inflation

5. Capitalist Class: +$500,000 1% old money: new money: Inherited wealth
Longer rich = more prestige
new money:
fortunes made in business, stock market, inventions, entertainment
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6. Upper Middle Class: $100,000+ 15%
Professionals (Lawyers, physicians, architect) , small business owners or upper managers
College, most post-graduate

7. Lower-Middle class: $40,000+ 34%
Teachers, nurses, most skilled contractors, lower managers, etc.
Often college or technical training
Most have jobs that call for them to follow orders
Comfortable mainstream lifestyle
Threatened by taxes and inflation
Still feel they can climb the social ladder

8. Working class: ~$30,000 30% Unskilled blue and white collar workers
Retail, secretaries, service industry, factory workers
High school graduates
Jobs are less secure, more routine, more closely supervised
Fear being downsized in a recession

9. Working Poor: ~$16,000 16% Minimum wage jobs
Unskilled, low-paying, temporary and seasonal jobs
Most are high school dropouts
Use gov’t assistance to stay afloat
Fear “ending up on the streets”

10. Underclass: under $10,000 4%
Sometimes do low-paying, menial, temp work
Little/irregular education
No chance of climbing anywhere
Concentrated in cities

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12. Social Mobility: movement between social classes
Vertical: up or down; secretary promoted to management
Horizontal: change job within a class; doctor to a lawyer
Intergenerational: changing within family; fireman dad, accountant son

13. Activity
Individually: write a short story of someone who changed social classes over their lifetime
Describe which class they started with (and describe it) and which they ended up with (and describe it)
Which type of mobility was it?

14. Horatio Alger myth:
Many of Alger's works have been described as rags to riches stories, illustrating how down-and-out boys might be able to achieve the American Dream of wealth and success through hard work, courage, determination, and concern for others. This widely held view involves Alger's characters achieving extreme wealth and the subsequent remediation of their "old ghosts." Alger is noted as a significant figure in the history of American cultural and social ideals.
Through hard work, most anyone can rise to the top of the social ladder.
Based off of stories popular during the Second Industrial Revolution in America, the late 1800s when capitalism was going full steam and immigrants were thronging our cities
What might be the purpose of this myth? Why does it remain?
Question: Do you believe in the American Dream?
Can you rise through hard work and perseverance or is luck and starting economic condition hugely important in ultimate success?

15. 3 components of social class
Wealth:
the total value of everything someone owns, minus debts
Power:
the ability to carry out your will, even over the resistance of others
Prestige:
Respect, influence
Prestigious people can get tables at restaurants, even if their nominal power and wealth are low. Not just respect - also looks, fame, and popularity

16. How can you tell a person’s class?

17. Class and Prestige relativity
Plug in your income/wealth- see where you stand
So What Class are you in?
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18. List of prestigious jobs- Work in groups to rank 1-10
What do they jobs at the top have in common?
Higher levels of education
Higher paying
Greater autonomy
Greater abstract thought
How do people exhibit their prestige? (Stereotypically how would you expect a doctor or Senator to be different from a garbageman?)
Material objects
Their vocabulary
College choice
Location of home
The way we respect them (saluting, standing, etc.)
If a janitor walked into the room, would we stand?
What about the President?

19. Sources:
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