French and English writers who observed social inequalities in the 18th and 19th centuries formulated the idea that non-political factors such as economy and family strongly shaped society's political life. Henri de Saint-Simon was a French social theorist who began to discuss a connection between a country's government and its economic models. Building on his premise, three models of social class emerged that have significantly influenced a modern understanding of social class.
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- Marx's Model: German philosopher Karl Marx theorized that a society's social classes were created by its means of production, property ownership, and work and labor arrangements. Marx wrote extensively about capitalism and identified two major class distinctions: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. According to Marx, the bourgeoisie owns the capital or resources, and they purchase labor (and often exploit the laborers) to expand their resources. The proletariat lacks resources but possesses the ability to work and seek to work for an employer. Marx believed that social classes were locked in conflict between those who control production and those who produce resources. When a new class rises to control production, it affects the politics and structure of a society.
- Weber's Model: German sociologist Max Weber believed that social class has three facets. The first facet is class, which means economic position. The second facet is status, which is a person's popularity, honor, or influence. Status is a person's ability to influence others without using wealth, such as an artist or poet who influences people's ideologies. Weber's final facet is power. Power is a person's ability to achieve their will over the will of others, whether in the economic, political, social, or legal realms. Weber indicated two main classes: those who possessed property and those who did not.
- Bourdieu's Model: French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu claimed that social class is understood using the three tools of habitus, capital, and field. Habitus refers to a person's habits or inclinations, including physical and psychological habits that family, education, and interactions can influence. Capital refers to a person's economic, social, and cultural resources. Both habitus and capital interact in a person's social field, which is a sphere of society with distinct rules and history. These fields may be specific, like a school or institution, or broad, like medicine or art. Bourdieu stratified society as upper, middle, and working classes and theorized about how a person's tools (habitus, capital, and field) affected their social class.
Each of these three models has influenced the way modern sociologists study social class.
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Several dimensions of life directly influence a person's social class. The following chart explores these dimensions.
| Dimension | Explanation |
|---|---|
| Education | A person's educational opportunities are influenced by their social class, as those with more money can afford to pursue more educational opportunities than those with less money. Education level can also create opportunities to generate income. |
| Income | Income, a person's earnings from work and investments, strongly impacts economic standing and ability to meet their basic needs and engage in leisure activity. |
| Wealth | Wealth is the total of a person's assets, such as income, inheritance, and property, excluding debt. Wealth can create opportunities for education and work. |
| Work | A person's work affects their income, wealth, and broader social interactions. Education can broaden one's work opportunities. |
| Family | A person's family background provides the foundation for their position regarding education, work, and wealth. While people can move between social classes based on their individual decisions and actions, a child's social class is initially determined by their family's social class. |
In addition to the above factors, sociologists study the effect of race and ethnicity on a person's social class.
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An economic model of social classes shows five social classes in the United States. The following list covers what the five social classes are in detail:
- Upper Class: The upper class comprises only a small percentage, approximately one percent, of the population of the U.S. These individuals often hold significant power in the corporate world. The upper class includes people with inherited money, who may not work for their money, and those with new money, who worked their way into the upper class.
- Upper Middle Class: Members of the upper middle class tend to hold bachelor's or advanced degrees and often work in management positions. They work hard to create a comfortable life.
- Lower Middle Class: Members of the lower middle class may hold bachelor's or associate's degrees and sometimes work for individuals in the upper middle class. These individuals also work hard to possess both necessities and comforts.
- Working Class: The working class is comprised of people who perform blue-collar labor and may not possess college degrees. For people in the working class, finances are often tight.
- Lower Class: The lower class refers to those living in poverty who may be under-employed or unemployed and lack the finances to provide life's necessities.
According to a February 2023 article in U.S. News & World Report, an income of more than $156,600 qualifies as upper class, $52,200–$156,600 qualifies as middle class, and under $52,200 qualifies as working or lower class.
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Sociology is the study of human societies, the processes that preserve and change them, and the interactions between them. The term ''social class'' refers to people who possess similar status based on characteristics such as education, wealth, work, income, family, race, and ethnicity. In an economic model of social class, class is determined by economic factors such as labor, wages, and the production and possession of goods. Three major theories have influenced the modern understanding of social class. Marx's model looks at class as a division between the bourgeoisie, who own capital, and the proletariat, who provide labor. Weber's model explains three parts of social class: class, status, and power. Bourdieu's model explored class through the three parts of habitus, field, and capital.
Important dimensions of social class include education, wealth (all a person's assets excluding debts), income (a person's earnings from work and investments), work, family, and ethnicity. In the United States, people are often stratified into four classes: upper class (people making over $156,600 and holding powerful positions), middle class (people making between $52,200–$156,600 and often have college degrees), working class (people earning under $52,200), and lower class (people often living in poverty and lacking necessities).
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Video Transcript
What is Social Class?
A social class is a large group of people who occupy a similar position in an economic system. There are several different dimensions of social class, including:
- Income
- Wealth
- Power
- Occupation
- Education
- Race
- Ethnicity
While defining social classes in the U.S. is difficult, most sociologists recognize four main categories: upper class, middle class, working class, and the lower class. Let's examine these concepts further.
Dimensions of Social Class
Income refers to earnings from work or investments, while wealth refers to all of those assets an individual owns, such as cash, savings and checking accounts, stocks, bonds, real estate, etc. minus outstanding debts. Most people make money from work, but for the wealthy, much of theirs is inherited. As a result, wealth is distributed much more unevenly than income, because wealth is typically passed down from generation to generation. In the United States, wealth is an important source of power. The small number of people who control most of the wealth can more easily shape the agenda of society. Here is a picture of the distribution of wealth by class in the United States, according to the Economic Policy Institute:
Work is considered an important dimension of social class as well. People commonly give greater respect to those who have more prestigious occupations. In any society, those with high-prestige occupations often belong to more privileged categories of people. When it comes to occupational prestige, the highest-ranked occupations usually include careers that require higher levels of education, such as physicians, dentists, and engineers.
Likewise, education is an important dimension of social class. In fact, education is one of the strongest predictors of occupation, income, and wealth later in life. Most better-paying white-collar jobs require a college degree, while most blue-collar jobs require less schooling, and bring less income and prestige.
Finally, it is argued that nothing affects social standing as much as being born into a particular family. The family we are born into has a strong bearing on schooling, occupation, and income. Likewise, race and ethnicity are links to social class in the United States as well. For example, according to the U.S. Census Bureau in 2009, the average income of an African American family is $32,584, while the average white family makes $51,861. Keep in mind these are averages and are not exclusive of who can and has (or has not) achieved success in either ethnic group.
Social Classes in the U.S.
Defining social classes in the United States is difficult and subject to debate. Some sociologists divide the population into more classes than others. With this in mind, let's examine the four most common social classes: upper, middle, working, and lower. Sociologist John Macionis would define the various social classes in the following way:
The upper class makes up about 5% of the population and earns about $200,000 a year (some earn much more than that). In general, the more a family's income comes from inherited wealth, the more likely a person is to belong to the upper class.
The middle class makes up about 40-45% of the population and is, perhaps, the most diverse of all social classes. People in the upper level of this class have an income between $112,000 and $200,000, while people in the lower level of this class have an income between $48,000 and $112,000 a year.
The working class makes up about one-third of the population. Working class families are vulnerable to financial problems because of the lack of wealth they are able to accumulate. Many people in the working class hold blue-collar jobs that make between $27,000 and $48,000 a year.
Finally, the remaining 20% of our population makes up the lower class. Many persons in this social class live in poverty, work part-time, or do not work at all. especially when those in the lower class belong to a racial minority group of people. Some sociologists use the term underprivileged to describe those individuals who are located at the bottom of the class system, normally composed of people from racial or ethnic minority groups.
Lesson Summary
Let's review. A social class is a large group of people who occupy a similar position in an economic system. One's class position can make an enormous difference in terms of a person's lifestyle. In addition to wealth and income, dimensions of social class include:
- Power
- Education
- Occupation
- Race and ethnicity.
While there are many different social classes sociologists generally recognize four:
- Upper
- Middle
- Working
- Lower
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