Social Inequality in America - Essay Example

Introduction American growth and prosperity are based on her dream. Several great steps have beenachieved, following the guidance by her dream. However, some sectors have failed to fully meet their potentials. Among these, being the creation of social equality to the Americans. From researches carried out at different instances, it can be shown that America still suffers a lot of inequalities as much as gender, race and class are concerned. The paper analyses these issues in the American society with the aid of the work from several scholarly researches. American Dream This ethos that nationally binds the United States was drafted from the United States declaration of Independence. It is rooted in creating freedom in the society. The American dream is aimed at creating freedom that achieves success and prosperity in the national endeavors. The America dream is focused on creating a full, better and richer life for all the people. This statement refers to equity in opportunity to people regardless of social divisions in the society. Given the opportunity, everyone is believed to be able to achieve, no matter their circumstances or social stratifications. The dream from the United States declaration of Independence emphasizes on equity among men and women, based on inalienable rights. Therefore, all people have equal rights to liberty, life and pursuit of happiness. This brings about equity in the society, as highlighted in the texts. Social Inequality in America American has a social inequity stratification system ranging from class, gender and politics. These factors are determined by power, which is the authority vested upon a person to make the other carry out duties, according to the rules and legislation. This power is also known as the authority that it is willingly dissipated or legitimate. At the same time, coercion or illegitimate power is the taken under force. Property is another factor of inequality that is based on one’s possession. It is generally the measure of social class. Finally, prestige marks another factor of inequality where one’s position in the society is determined (Domhoff 3). In American today, prestige is tied to the occupation one is undertaking, that is the lawyers, doctors and teacher. Normally, prestige is tied to the social class. Despite her move towards the dream, America has not yet achieved her equity in most of these areas. Up to date, America still suffers gender inequality in some areas that are characterized in the early work of Loe. Women are still treated as sex objects in some working places to date, especially in bars and restaurants (Williams 74). Despite the changes in time, the conception of a woman has not much changed, according to Loe in these places the women are “‘objectified victims’ of sexualized workplaces, but are also architects of gender, power and sexuality in such setting” (Williams 73). The general achievement of equity of women in these workplaces has never been a success. The structure of these places still treat the employed bar waitress as ‘cheerleaders’ since their work is to entertain men (Williams 75). Some employment companies still go for recruitment based on the ideology of “women jobs” (Williams 73). This job matches them due to their sex segregation. This is typically a social inequality that has rooted in many job posts in America. In addition, the dressing style expected among the women is a pattern that reveals their sex nature that Loe referred to in the Bazoom uniform, just to make a woman sexy before men (Williams 81). Gender inequality in jobs takes some wide variations, where in some instances women are still not accepted in some jobs due to their gender. For instance, jobs like the clerical work today is majorly associated with women just like the waitress and bar attendants in the Bazoom since they need individual who “act like a woman” (Williams 82). Inequity still prevails in most places in America. The segregation in language, race and colour and class dominate many American industrial systems. Just like in the slaughter house where jobs were given under racial basis, employment opportunity and work environment have never been equal. Employment opportunities are still based on one’s origin, the pay system as well as the work environment. Charles brings about this in his work; however, some little improvements have been noted. In his work Charles starts with the work place race inequality where the black man “Who that cracker think he is”, he continues “keep treating me like a Mexican and I will beat him up.” (LeDuff 89).This shows a case where people still treat each other in their work place based on the origin. The types of job and job environment based on segregation have not changed much. Notably, Charles defines the people who were given the dirty job. His observation finds the whites as mechanics and supervisors, the Indians forming the majority of the supervisors while the Blacks and Mexican were left with the dirty jobs (LeDuff 90). This comes from the beliefs that blacks and the Mexican cannot perform good work, especially when they are at the top of the management hierarchy. As he reflects on the blood burnouts, inequities of getting job opportunity can be seen as a challenge today. Despite the fact that some people meet the qualification criteria and present the need of the job opportunity, getting the job is not a guarantee (LeDuff 100). He reflects on the young black man who despite that he merits the job and sleeps at the train while others own houses, he cannot get the job. At the same time, chances of employment were availed even to the criminals and the less qualified (LeDuff 90). Language becomes a hindrance to employment as the employer shouts at the recruits “this is America and I want to start hearing some English?” (LeDuff 103). These are some barricades to societal equity in America to date. Moreover, power in the United States is still vested in the hands of a few individuals. This comes as Domhoff writes “the owners and top-level managers in large income producing are far and away the dominant power figures in the United States (Domhoff 1). He questions whether the United State is a democratic nation since the power is vested on other areas. In the United States still there exist power some elite groups. Domhoff identifies as sample group as a corporate community and policy formation organizations, which are charged by the upper class (Domhoff 2). The ownership of National property is based majorly in the hands of these groups, which still hold the evolving and circulating stock in the nation and the groups are the major stake holders to the cooperate boards (Domhoff 3). These are generally attributed to the social ties and cohesion among these people. As American fights to meet her goals of the dream, new challenges in setting equity still come up. Economical contraction makes things even harder since every individual is fighting for his group only (Domhoff 3). So as any limit of inequity exists, an economical problem enhances it. This can be taken from the work of Eduardo. His ideology on the new racism explains these factors, especially, the notion of cultural rather than biological differences. The change in the United State cultural system is widening the equity gap as people become more selfish in the society (Bonilla 21). Eduardo’s second point is that inequity has been rationalized by de-contextualized use of discourse of liberalism and individualism (Bonilla 22). This is where there is a belief that equity is supposed to be based on one’s merit rather than on a provision. Lastly, he puts forward that of a celebration of a nationalism that acquires ethno-character, where by American rewards are based on the whites and the other people who are associated with them (Bonilla 24). It can be seen that from these aspects, generating equality in American remains a challenge since it is a concept rooted in the minds as well as in the national structures (Bonilla 25). When these issues are scrutinized the marginalized groups always remain with a lot of challenges, such as inability to purchase health, poverty and low education system. Since women for a long time were very much alienated from basic equality issues, the impact still can be seen in that in most families men are the sole breadwinners (Bonilla 58). Economic challenges in the government majorly affect the marginalized groups as their capacity to get employment, better pay and a good working environment become minimal. The inequality is still sprawling in many other sectors, and globalization impacts on the American dream achievements (Bonilla 87). Class Position America has not achieved her dreams as far as equality is concerned; this is due to strong social inequality ties especially in class, gender and race. Going by Eduardo’ s argument, the best change in America to achieve the dream is a change in national ideologies as well as individual ideologies to those focusing on American as one united nation with no cultural and societal boundaries (Williams 79). Class stratification is never easy to achieve, unless the government draws some equity policies as well as an enabling environment to break the class boundaries. Conclusion Every nation is dreaming of achieving perfect equality and equity in its system. However, achieving this has been a challenge since inequality is based on several route courses, such as people’s conscious on issues like gender and race. In addition, sources of in equality such as power and social class have great strengths that make them easily mobilized. In America, the major sources of equity like the elite groups are the power wielders, who are not easy to neutralize. However, inequalities impact negatively especially on the globalization and economical difficulties to the marginalized group. Our class position is that new measures of reducing inequality should be drawn because equality is not yet achieved in America Works Cited Charlie, LeDuff. Work and Other sins: Life in New York City and Thereabouts. New York, NY: Penguin. 2010. Print. Christian, L., Williams, Patti, A., and Kirsten, Dellinger. Sexuality in the working Place: Organizational Control, Sexual Harassment, and the Pursuit of Pleasure. University of Texas: Department of Sociology. 1999. Print. Domhoff, William.  Who’s Rule America: Power and Politics in the Year 2000? New York, NY: Mayfield. 2005. Print. Eduardo, Bonilla. White Supremacy and Racism in the Post-Civil Rights Era. Colorado:  SilvaLynne Rienner Publishers. 2001. Print.   Read More