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Social Inequality
Social inequality refers to unequal opportunities and rewards for different social positions or
statuses within a group or society.Social inequality will always favor the wealthy and be a thorn to the
poor. Social class would entail those with so much hence the prosperous and those with so less, who are
the poor.In almost every part of the world, physical traits are a pointer to which class a person
belongs.Esteem and prestige are common attributes that can be used to differentiate social
class.Individuals in the higher classes are bound to have a high self-esteem and prestige compared to
those in low social class.It is assumed that a poor person may not have the means to dress like the rich
and thus mode of dress is also a perfect comparison for both social classes.
Max Weber uses social classed to examine wealth and status,whereby for him social class is
strongly associated with priveledges and prestige.He concluded that it could be defined as a broad
category of similarly ranked people located in a hierarchy and distinguished from another large group in
the hierarchy by traits such as occupation, education, wealth, and income.In the modern world, social
class is categorized into three main divisions, upper-class, middle-class and lower-class.
I would point out that social class is the best perfect picture for social inequality since it would tend
to separate people into groups that are not equal in so many ways.Besides economic ability, which also
is one of the leading causes of inequality,I would say there are those that are more painful such as
racism and sexism.Why say that africans are inferior to the europeans whereas, the only thing that
differs is their skin, accent and also the fact that Europe is more developed than the African continent.
Race cannot be explained either biblically or biologically; only human beings have the tendency to come
up with their own views.Effects of racism can result in discriminatory hiring or issuing of
paychecks.Racial inequality also can bring about diminished activities for members of marginalized
groups in turn leading to repeated cycles of poverty.Another form of social inequality is the sex and
gender inequality.Mostly this inequality is much evident in the African continent, whereby the girl child
will be denied the same rights as the male child.Even in most states, women are under-represented in
political activities, and decision making processes.In many countries,women and girls lack the same
opportunities to education as a male child that limits their chances to succeed in life and further limit
their ability to contribute to their societies.
