Throughout everyone 's life there will be struggles in every situation, some more than others. One main issue our society deals with in today 's world is money. Money has an unbelievable power for only being a piece of paper. People nowadays will most likely do anything for money as it is a key attribute to today 's society. As society has improved and advanced throughout history money has become more of a problem for several people in the world. With more technologies being created and more advancements in useful everyday things the temptations to spend more and more money everyday increases drastically. When money is being talked about there is usually three classes, the upper class, middle class, and lower class. Being in the upper …show more content…
This analysis is not intended to suggest that because it is often functional, poverty should exist, or that it must exist. For one thing, poverty has many more dysfunctions that functions: for another, it is possible to suggest functional alternatives. For example, society’s dirty work could be done without poverty, either by automation or by paying “dirty workers” decent wages. Nor is it necessary for the poor to subsidize the many activities they support through their low-wage jobs. This would, however, drive up the costs of these activities, which would result in higher prices to their customers and clients. Similarly, many of the professionals who flourish because of the poor could be given other roles. Social workers could provide counseling to the affluent, as they prefer to do anyway; and the police could devote to traffic and other organized crime.” Poverty is a thing of deviance in today’s world of society. The poor and less fortunate are an aggregate of society. Though poverty is shown to be a negative there are several positives to it as shown by Gans in his report. Poverty is a universal problem, but with the positive outlook on the problem it can be better. Poverty strikes almost everywhere around the world and impacts several people even not living in poverty. Though the positives that may be looked at as good are completely wrong compared to the bad. The struggles some people endure through poverty are just completely unjust and inhumane at times. With all the events that have occurred with job loss and other economic problems this has created a huge struggle for middle and lower class americans. Poverty is a problem that is always a work in progress to fix, but maybe eventually it will all be
David K. Shipler in his essay At the Edge of Poverty talks about the forgotten America. He tries to make the readers feel how hard is to live at the edge of poverty in America. Shipler states “Poverty, then, does not lend itself to easy definition” (252). He lays emphasis on the fact that there is no single universal definition of poverty. In fact poverty is a widespread concept with different dimensions; every person, country or culture has its own definition for poverty and its own definition of a comfortable life.
America is divided into two main groups, rich or poor. There is some grey area among these groups which is referred to as the middle class. The problem with the middle class is that most people think they belong in the middle class because they do not want to associate themselves with neither rich nor poor; there are stigmas attached to each side of the spectrum.
Although poverty has minimized, it is still significant poverty which is characterized by a numerous amount of things. There are two types of poverty case and insular. “Case poverty is the farm family with the junk-filled yard and the dirty children playing in the bare dirt” (Galbraith 236)Case poverty is not irretraceable and usually caused if someone in the household experiences “ mental deficiency, bad health, inability to adapt to the discipline of industrial life, uncontrollable procreation, alcohol, some educational handicap unrelated to community shortcomings” (Galbraith 236).Case poverty is often blamed on the people for their shortcomings but on some levels can be to pinpoint one person's shortcomings that caused this poverty. Most modern poverty is insular and is caused by things people in this community cannot control. “The most important characteristic of insular poverty is forces, common to all members of the community, that restrain or prevent participation in economic life and increase rates of return.
I agree with Gans stance because in the article The Positive Functions of Poverty, he makes several valid points while shedding light on the economic, social, cultural, and political functions (Gans, 1972). In my opinion, Gans sums it up best by making mention of poverty being functional for those who do not struggle with the thoughts of where their next meal will coming from
Poverty is a potential outcome for everyone. It’s sneaky and many people fall victim to it every year. No one believes that they have the potential to fall into debt, but it can happen through a string of bad luck, time running short, and other possibilities that can’t be controlled. People who are struggling with difficulty believe that there is no way out because no one will help them. However, there are ways for us, as a society, to help those who are short on income receive the help that they need. Many of the impoverished are thought to be slackers, addicts, or self-destructive to their lives. Society can help each other by dismembering the stereotypes given to people who are underneath the “Poverty Line” that they used as wedges between the classes. Labels given to those who’re poor have nothing to do with who they are as humans.
Some people believe that poverty is beneficial. For example, Herbert J. Gans. is a big fan of poverty. In his essay, “The Uses of Poverty: The Poor Pay All,” he explains the benefits of having poor people in society. “The existence of poverty ensures that society’s “dirty work” will be done.” -Herbert J. Gans (Gans, 1971.) He believes that the poverty level needs to be relatively high to support the comfortable lives of middle and upper class people. The working poor support the other classes. However, it is very difficult for people in the lower class to make a move upwards. Generally in the “dirty jobs” pay very little and there is little to no opportunity for advancement. Often times, there is an ascribed status for those in the lower class. Since their parents were poor, they have little to no opportunities to have a life any different. It is very difficult for these individuals to attend college, due to rising tuition prices. In today’s society it is nearly impossible to attain a high paying job without a college degree. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs have been moved overseas to save money, but that means finding work in America is very difficult (Frontline Charts, 2013.) Even if they can find work, wages for such jobs have been dropping and are often not enough to support a family or even
Everyone knows what the word poverty means. It means poor, unable to buy the necessities to survive in today's world. We do not realize how easy it is for a person to fall into poverty: A lost job, a sudden illness, a death in the family or the endless cycle of being born into poverty and not knowing how to overcome it. There are so many children in poverty and a family's structure can effect the outcome. Most of the people who are at the poverty level need some type of help to overcome the obstacles. There are mane issues that deal with poverty and many things that can be done to stop it.
The world is a very complex system with over a 100 diverse cultures and norms. Religion, wealth, poverty, and political diversity pull us apart. Since the beginning of time humans were never similar for a purpose. What if we try? Try to find our differences more alike in ways we never thought of. What will happen when these views and perspectives coincides with one another?
When one thinks of poverty often the mental picture that comes to mind is of single parent welfare, dependent, women and unemployed, drug-addicted, alcoholic lackadaisical men. The children are often forgotten. The impact of poverty, the destruction of crime and stigmatization of the violence on the children is more devastating and irreversible than the miseducation and illiteracy that most often companies poverty. The implication is not the poverty can not be overcome but that the cycles of teenage pregnancy, welfare dependency, and dropping out of high school continues and are hard to break. The badges of poverty are just as addictive and capitiving as any disease such as alcohol or drugs.
Poverty can be defined as the state of being extremely poor. This means that a person has very little to no financial resources or provisions necessary for survival. It proves to be a serious issue that many families in the United States have to face on a daily basis. Poverty is a serious issue because it influences employment rates, which in turn hurts economic growth when the rate is low, and it also contributes to the number of Americans whom are actually homeless today. From a sociological point of view, poverty can be looked at using several perspectives such as the functional perspective, which shows how poverty exists to keep society up and running; the symbolic interactionism perspective, in which stereotypes come into play, showing
Gans’ essay, “The Uses of Poverty: The Poor Pay All”, is extremely important in the analysis of the frontline documentary. Gans has a bit of a different approach on poverty and the poor. For example, he says, “Today, poverty is more maligned than the political machine ever was; yet it, too, is a persistent social phenomenon.” Basically, he argues that the poor are a very important part in society. He goes on to explain different functions of poverty. First, he states that the existence of poverty ensures that society’s dirty work will be done. Society in some ways forces the poor to do these jobs because they almost always don’t have the choice, and they make them do these at low wages. This was one of the hard things that the two families were facing. They both had to be satisfied with low wage dirty work jobs to get by. No matter how hard they tried to find better jobs, they just couldn’t push through. Another benefit that the poor have to offer the world is that poverty creates jobs for a number of occupations that protect the rest of society from them. Without the poor, the police force would be minuscule. Also, the poor buy goods others do not want. This helps the economy immensely because these products would eventually just be thrown out if the poor didn’t purchase them. The poor are also culturally recognized in history. For example, most Americans listen to the blues, which originated from the southern poor. And on top of that, they
Poverty is an undeniable problem in America. In 2014, 14.8 percent of the United States was in poverty (“Hunger and Poverty Fact Sheet”). There are more people in the United States than it seems that do not have their basic necessities. In an
Poverty, also known as the silent killer, exists in every corner of the world. In fact, almost half of the world’s population lives in poverty. According to the United States Census Bureau, there were 46.7 million people living in poverty the year of 2014 (1). Unfortunately, thousands of people die each year due to this world-wide problem. Some people view poverty as individuals or families not being able to afford an occupational meal or having to skip a meal to save money. However, this is not the true definition of poverty. According to the author of The Position of Poverty, John Kenneth Galbraith, “people are poverty-stricken when their income, even if adequate for survival, falls radically behind that of the community”, which means people
“Money is number and numbers never end if it takes money to be happy your search for happiness will never end.” (Bob Marley). For the majority of people in our modern-capitalist world, money is the first thing, and sometimes the only thing that measures success in life. Money can buy power. Money can buy fame. Money can buy time. Sometimes money can even buy a life. So money has become the first common goal for everybody. There are many different perspectives, and how people view the world, in terms of success, and money. Money is not the root of all evil, but the love of money is the root of all evil.
He cites dirty work and job creation as one of the economic functions that poverty serves (Gans 278-279). Dirty work refers to menial jobs that are important in society, but can only be performed by people with no other life options. Some professions, such as policemen and charity organisations, benefit from the existence of the poor. The author notes that, as much as these institutions claim to be in existence for the goodness of all, they would have no purpose if the poor did not