Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns

What Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns covers

Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns is examined in Unit 4 Section B, Social Inequality — compulsory, and it draws its evidence from everything else you have studied. It covers measuring social class in Britain, the distribution of income and wealth, work and pay: occupational inequality, class inequality: the evidence, gender inequality: the evidence, ethnic inequality: the evidence, age inequality: the evidence, disability and inequality, power and political inequality, poverty and social exclusion and inequality in Wales: the evidence base.

The 11 subtopics

Each one has its own page.

• Measuring social class in BritainOfficial classification used to measure social class in Britain, subjective measure of class and how Bourdieu's idea of capital broadens the measurement of class.Open →
• The distribution of income and wealthHow inheritance sustains inequality across generations, distinction between original and disposable income and how the tax and benefit system redistributes income.Open →
• Work and pay: occupational inequalityGender pay gap, horizontal segregation in the labour market and motherhood penalty.Open →
• Class inequality: the evidenceSocial gradient in health, how material deprivation affects a child's schooling and how cultural capital affects a child's schooling.Open →
• Gender inequality: the evidenceTriple shift, one explanation offered for lower recorded female offending and concept of the male gaze.Open →
• Ethnic inequality: the evidenceWhy ethnic differences in attainment cannot be separated from class, institutional racism and why the ethnic profile of Wales makes local evidence important.Open →
• Age inequality: the evidenceWhy home ownership has become an age inequality, why poverty in later life is gendered and dependency ratio.Open →
• Disability and inequalityMedical model of disability, social model of disability and barrier that disables someone with a mobility impairment.Open →
• Power and political inequalityWeber's three types of legitimate authority, rational-legal authority and pluralist view of the distribution of power.Open →
• Poverty and social exclusionAbsolute poverty, relative poverty and consensual measure of poverty.Open →
• Inequality in Wales: the evidence baseOfficial measure used to compare deprivation between areas of Wales, three domains included in a multiple deprivation index and why an area-based deprivation measure can mislead about individuals.Open →

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Take Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns further

The same content, four other ways.

Commonly confused

Pairs that lose marks when they are blurred together.

• Horizontal segregation vs Vertical segregation

  Horizontal segregation: the concentration of women and men in different types of work. Vertical segregation: the concentration of one group in the lower grades of the same occupation.

• Power vs Authority

  Power: the ability to achieve one's aims despite opposition. Authority: influence that those subject to it accept as rightful.

• Social exclusion vs Poverty

  Social exclusion: being shut out of participation, of which income is one cause. Poverty: it is a lack of resources.

Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   What is the official classification used to measure social class in Britain?

   Model answer

   The National Statistics Socio-economic Classification, known as NS-SEC.

2. 2

   On what does NS-SEC base a person's class position?

   Model answer

   On their occupation, and in particular on employment relations and conditions such as security, autonomy and career prospects.

3. 3

   How many analytic classes does the full version of NS-SEC contain?

   Model answer

   Eight.

4. 4

   Why is a condensed three-class version of NS-SEC often used?

   Model answer

   It groups occupations into higher managerial and professional, intermediate, and routine and manual, which gives large enough categories for reliable comparison.

5. 5

   Which occupational classification did NS-SEC replace?

   Model answer

   The Registrar General's classification of social class based on occupational skill.

6. 6

   Give one criticism of using occupation to measure class.

   Model answer

   It cannot classify people outside paid work, such as the long-term unemployed, students, retired people and full-time carers.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns revision questions

What does Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns cover in WJEC A-Level Sociology?

11 subtopics: measuring social class in britain, the distribution of income and wealth, work and pay: occupational inequality, class inequality: the evidence, gender inequality: the evidence, ethnic inequality: the evidence, age inequality: the evidence, disability and inequality, power and political inequality, poverty and social exclusion and inequality in wales: the evidence base. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.

How is Social Inequality: Evidence and Patterns organised?

By the WJEC 601-5237-0 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.