SOCIAL INEQUALITY SOC 2208 / DSOC 2090, Spring 2015 Professor: Kim Weeden Teaching Assistants: Alex Currit, Maria De Lourdes Ramirez Flores
Lectures: Tuesday and Thursday, 10:10-11:25, Riley-Robb 125 (I’m trying to get a better room!) Office Hours: (TA) Alex Currit: 11:35-1:35 Thursdays, 365 Uris Hall; [email protected] (TA) Maria De Lourdes Ramirez Flores: TBA, 357 Uris Hall; [email protected] (Prof) Kim Weeden: 1:45-3:15 Fridays except Jan 23, March 27 & May 1 376 Uris Hall, [email protected] website: www.kimweeden.com Course website “Soc 2208 Social Inequality” (www.blackboard.cornell.edu) Course twitter account: @Soc2208
Overview: All known societies are characterized by inequality, with the most privileged people, families, or groups enjoying disproportionately large shares of income, wealth, health, prestige, political power, and other socially valued goods. After a long period of decline in the mid 20th century, income and wealth inequality have increased dramatically over the past 40 years, while inequality on other dimensions stagnated. These trends in inequality have generated renewed interest among academics and policy makers, captured the attention of the media and the general public, and reemerged as a focus of political activity and discourse.
This course introduces contemporary and classical scholarship on inequalities in income, social class, race, and gender. The goal is to give you the analytic tools you need to understand contemporary patterns and trends in inequality; to evaluate the veracity of claims about inequality that are often bandied about in the popular press and in political rhetoric on both sides of the aisle; to understand some of the sources of inequality, its changes (or lack thereof) over time, and its variation across countries; and to identify some of the consequences of inequality for individuals, families, neighborhoods, economies, and political systems.
The course focuses on advanced industrialized societies rather than on the developing world, although some of the general mechanisms that lead to inequality may be common to all societies. Most of the readings are from sociology, with some readings from economics, political science, psychology, and anthropology.
General: This course fulfills Social and Behavioral Analysis requirement in A&S, the SBA-D (“Diversity”) requirement in CALS, and other College’s distributional requirements. It also fulfills the “overview” requirement for the Minor in Inequality Studies, an interdisciplinary minor that’s open to students in any college and that’s administered by the Center for the Study of Inequality (inequality.cornell.edu; @InequalityCU). The course does not have prerequisites.
Course structure: The students who get the most out of the course are those who do the assigned readings. The volume of reading isn’t especially high, but some of the readings, particularly early in the semester, are a bit difficult. Expect to spend substantial time outside of class on them.
Unfortunately, the Sociology department lacks the TA resources to run discussion sections. You should always feel free to ask questions during lecture. If you’re not comfortable with this, please contact me or one of the TAs via e-mail, or stop by during our office hours.
Students who attend class do significantly better in the course than students who do not attend class. I like to think that this reflects a causal effect, not just a self-selection effect.
Grading: Your final grade will be based on your performance on in-class, closed book, non- cumulative exams. Four exams will be administered throughout the semester: Feb 19, March 17, April 14, and May ?? (TBA). You are allowed to skip (not take) one of the first three exams. You do not need to notify me in advance. Everyone must take the final exam in May.
Each exam is worth a maximum of 100 points, or 33% of your final grade. If you choose to take all four exams, I will drop the lowest of the four scores in calculating your final grade.
It’s your responsibility to check Blackboard to make sure you received credit for an exam that you took, and to notify us promptly if you did not. If there’s a discrepancy, we’ll ask you to produce your graded exam, so hold onto it.
To help you prepare for the exams, I will distribute study questions periodically throughout each unit. Your exams will be scored based on demonstrated mastery of the relevant material, the logic of your arguments, and clarity. (More on my expectations later on.) The TAs will be happy to meet with you to go over your exams and help you study for the next one, but they cannot change exam grades.
I often standardize students’ scores on any given exam across graders. This way, if you draw a relatively harsh grader on an exam, you won’t be penalized; conversely, if you pull an easy grader, you won’t be advantaged relative to the unlucky students who didn’t. Because inequality.
Final Grades: I don’t “grade on the [normal/Bell] curve” or impose a C average. I do reserve the right to alter the cutoff points for letter grades to maintain a decent distribution in the final grades. Approximate cutoff percentages for letter grades are as follows: 98.1-100=A+, 93.5-98=A, 90.5- 93.4=A-, 87.5-90.4=B+, 83.5-87.4=B, 80.5-83.4=B-, and so forth.
I only give A+’s in the course to students who earn an A+ on at least one exam and whose final point total is in the top 3% of the class. Because inequality.
Make-up exams: Because you can choose not to take one of the first three exams with no questions asked and no penalty to your grade (see above), I don’t give makeup exams except in the case of a dire emergency on the order of a long-term hospitalization or a death in your immediate family. If you need a make-up exam, you must notify me and get my approval 12 hours in advance of the scheduled exam time.
Code of Integrity: I expect students to adhere to the Code of Academic Integrity (see http://cuinfo.cornell.edu/Academic/AIC.html if you need a refresher). Any student who is caught cheating will receive a score of 0 on that exam, and this exam’s score will not be “dropped.”
Soc 2208/Dsoc 2090 Page 2
Learning Disabilities: If you have a documented learning disability, please introduce yourself to me at some point in the first two weeks of the term. Also, you’ll need to contact the TAs (cc me) at least 48 hours in advance of each scheduled exam to set up accommodations.
Course Materials: Most readings are drawn from Grusky & Szelenyi’s (“GS”) The Inequality Reader: Contemporary and Foundational Readings in Race, Class, and Gender, Second Edition. This text is available at the Cornell Campus Store and all other usual outlets. If you purchase the text online, make sure you get the right Grusky & Szelenyi reader – there are several out there.
Other required readings, lecture slides, study questions, grades, etc. will be posted on the course website.
Course Schedule / Readings Please read the materials before coming to class on the dates listed below. R = Required, S = Supplementary (i.e., recommended but not required)
Jan. 22: Introduction, no readings
PART ONE: THE SOURCES OF INEQUALITY
Jan 27: Is inequality inevitable? (GS 2-35) R: David B. Grusky, “The Stories about Inequality that we Love to Tell” (GS 2-15) R: Kingsley Davis & Wilbert E. Moore, “Some Principles of Stratification” R: Alan Krueger, “Inequality, Too Much of a Good Thing?” S: Claude S. Fischer, Michael Hout, Martín Sánchez Jankowski, Samuel R. Lucas, Ann Swidler, & Kim Voss, “Inequality by Design”
PART TWO: THE STRUCTURE OF INEQUALITY: INCOME, CLASS, STATUS, AND POWER
Jan. 29: Social class (GS 36-55) R: Karl Marx, “Classes in Capitalism and Pre-Capitalism” R: Erik Olin Wright, “Class Counts”
Feb. 3: Status, prestige, and honor (GS 56-85; website) R: Max Weber, “Class, Status, Party” R: W. Lloyd Warner, with Marcia Meeker & Kenneth Eells, “Social Class in America” (website) S: Tak Wing Chan and John H. Goldthorpe, “Is There a Status Order in Contemporary British Society?”
Feb. 5: Power elites (GS 100-117) R: C. Wright Mills, “The Power Elite” R: William Domhoff, “Who Rules America”
Soc 2208/Dsoc 2090 Page 3 Feb 10: Knowledge elites (GS 118-135; 741-746) R: Alvin Gouldner, “The Future of Intellectuals and the Rise of the New Class R: David Brooks, “Bobos in Paradise” R: Charles Murray, “Poverty and Marriage, Income Inequality and Brains” (GS 741-746)
Feb 12: Income and poverty (GS 136-152; 730-734) R: Barbara Ehrenreich, “Nickel-and-Dimed” R: Katherine S. Newman and Victor Tan Chen, “The Missing Class” R: Robert Frank, “The Pragmatic Case for Reducing Income Inequality” (GS 730-734)
Feb 19: First exam (in class)
Feb 24: Why is income inequality increasing? (GS 86-99; 696-703; 735-740) R: Emmanual Saez, “Striking it Richer” R: Grusky and Weeden, “Is Market Failure Behind the Takeoff in Inequality?” R: Jake Rosenfeld, “Little Labor: How Union Decline is Changing the American Landscape.” (GS 696-703) S: Bebchuk and Fried, “Tackling the Managerial Power Problem” (GS 735-740)
Feb 26: Why do some countries have more poverty than others? R: Timothy M. Smeeding, “Poorer by Comparison (GS 153-158) R: Bruce Western, “Incarceration, Unemployment, and Inequality” (GS 208-212) S: Joshua Cohen and Charles Sabel, “Flexicurity” (GS 719-724)
PART THREE: WHO GETS AHEAD AND WHY?
March 3: Family background & social mobility (GS 469-526; 452-454) R: David Featherman and Robert Hauser, “A Refined Model of Occupational Mobility” R: Richard Breen, “Social Mobility in Europe” R: Gregory Acs and Seth Zimmerman, “Like Watching Grass Grow?” (GS 517-526) S: Jonsson et al, “It’s A Decent Bet That Our Children Will Be Professors Too.” (GS 499-516) S: Timothy Egan, “No Degree, and No Way Back to the Middle” (GS 452-454)
March 5: Education (GS 527-552; 455-468; 648-659; 711-716) R: Peter M. Blau & Otis Dudley Duncan (with Andrea Tyree), “The Process of Stratification” R: David Harding, Christopher Jencks, Leonard Lopoo, and Susan Mayer, “Family Background and Income in Adulthood, 1961-1999” R: Annette Lareau, “Unequal Childhoods.” (GS 648-659) S: Breen, Luijkx, Muller, and Pollak, “Nonpersistent Inequality in Educational Attainment,” (GS 455-468) S: James Heckman, “Skill Formation and the Economics of Investing in Disadvantaged Children” (GS 711-716)
March 10: Aspirations and expectations (GS 553-588) R: William H. Sewell, Archibald O. Haller, and Alejandro Portes, “The Educational and Early Occupational Attainment Process” R: Jay MacLeod, “Ain't No Makin' It: Leveled Aspirations in a Low-Income Neighborhood”
Soc 2208/Dsoc 2090 Page 4 S: Dalton Conley, “The Pecking Order” (GS 584-588)
March 12: Social Networks (GS 589-613) R: Mark S. Granovetter, “The Strength of Weak Ties” R: Nan Lin, “Social Networks and Status Attainment” R: Ronald S. Burt, “Structural Holes” R: Roberto Fernandez and Isabel Fernandez-Mateo, “Networks, Race, and Hiring” (GS 602-613)
March 17: Exam 2
March 19: Schools and neighborhoods (GS 159-195; 214-221; 717-718) R: William Julius Wilson, “Jobless Poverty” (GS 159-169) R: Douglas Massey & Nancy Denton, “American Apartheid” (GS 170-181) R: Anne R. Pebley & Narayan Sastry, “Neighborhoods, Poverty, & Children’s Well-Being” (GS 182-195) R: Stefanie DeLuca and James E. Rosenbaum, “Escaping Poverty: Can Housing Vouchers Help?” (GS 214-221) S: David Brooks, “The Harlem Miracle” (GS 717-718)
PART FOUR: RACE AND GENDER INEQUALITY
March 24: The new complexities of race (GS 222-236, GS 304-317) R: Omi & Winant, “Racial Formation in the United States” R: Reynolds Farley, “Racial Identities in 2000” R: Herbert Gans, “The Possibility of a New Racial Hierarchy in the 21st Century” (GS 304-313)
March 26: Immigrant incorporation (GS 237-252) R: Alejandro Portes & Min Zhou, “The New Second Generation: Segmented Assimilation and Its Variants” R: Mary C. Waters, “Black Identities: West Indian Immigrant Dreams and American Realities”
March 31 & April 2: Spring Break
April 7: Why is there still racial and ethnic inequality in educational attainment? (GS 276-281; website) R: Claude Steele, “Stereotype Threat and African-American Student Achievement” (GS 276-81) R: Fordham & Ogbu, “Acting White” (website)
April 9: Why is there still racial and ethnic inequality in employment? (GS 254-75; GS 314-17) R: Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan, “Are Emily and Greg More Employable Than Lakisha and Jamal?” R: Devah Pager, “Marked” R: Joe R. Feagin, “The Continuing Significance of Race” S: Lawrence Bobo, “What Do You Call a Black Man with a Ph.D.?” (GS 314-317)
Soc 2208/Dsoc 2090 Page 5 April 14: Exam 3
April 16: Gender roles and housework (GS 326-331; 389-404) R: Judith Lorber, “The Social Construction of Gender” R: Arlie Russell Hochschild, “The Time Bind”
April 21: Women’s participation in paid labor (GS 332-350) R: Lisa Belkin, “The Opt-Out Revolution” R: Pamela Stone, “Getting to Equal” R: Jerry Jacobs & Kathleen Gerson, “The Time Divide”
April 23: Do employers (still) discriminate against women? (GS 351-388, website) R: Shelley Correll, Steve Benard, & In Paik, “Is there a Motherhood Penalty”? R: Barbara F. Reskin, “Rethinking Employment Discrimination and its Remedies” R: Corinne Moss-Racusin, John Davidio, Victoria Brescoll, Mark Graham, and Jo Handelsman, “Science faculty’s subtle gender bias favors male students” (website) S: Claudia Goldin & Cecilia Rouse, “Orchestrating Inequality” S: Stephen Ceci, Wendy Williams, “Understanding current causes of women’s underrepresentation in science” (website)
April 28: “Men’s jobs” and “women’s jobs” (GS 389-411) R: Maria Charles & David B. Grusky, “Egalitarianism and Gender Inequality” R: Jerry Jacobs, “Detours on the Road to Equality”
April 30: The gender gap in wages (412-445, website) R: Trond Petersen & Laurie A. Morgan, “The Within-Job Gender Wage Gap” R: Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn, “The Gender Pay Gap” R: Paula England, “Devaluation and the Pay of Comparable Male and Female Occupations” S: Youngjoo Cha and Kim Weeden, “Overwork and the Gender Gap in Earnings” (website)
PART FIVE: UNEQUAL CONSEQUENCES, UNEQUAL FUTURES?
May 5: Consequences and course wrap-up (GS 614-634; GS 648-659; 672-695) R: Janny Scott. “Life at the Top in America Isn’t Just Better, It’s Longer” R: John Mullahy, Stephanie Robert, and Barbara Wolfe, “Health, Income, and Inequality” S: Joseph E. Stiglitz, “Globalism’s Discontents” (GS 672-680) S: Glenn Firebaugh, “The New Geography of Global Income Inequality” (GS 681-695)
May XX Exam 4 Date, location, and time to be announced after Feb 16, when the Registrar releases the Spring exam schedule.
The 4th exam will be an hour and a half, just like the other, in-term exams. If we draw an afternoon slot, the exam will end an hour earlier than the official time. If we draw a morning slot, we’ll start an hour later than the official time.
Soc 2208/Dsoc 2090 Page 6