Chapter
10
The
Architecture of Disadvantage: Poverty and Wealth
Americans
believe in competitive individualism: Success is based entirely
on individual merit. This belief is fostered not only by the
messages transmitted through the media but also by the socialization
children receive in school. Sociologists
Scott Cummings and Del Taebel surveyed children from grades 3
through 12 to see how they learn about economic life and social
stratification in the United States.1
The
researchers found that even young people can articulate the idea
that private ownership and individual productivity are necessary
components of a smooth-flowing economy. As one ninth-grader put
it:
People that own their own businesses will work
harder because they want to make more money; if no one can own
anything they aren't going to work so hard and so nobody will
make much money and then the economy falls apart.2
Although
younger children enthusiastically support the idea that the government
ought to do more to help poor people, by the 12th grade many
of them have come to hold the individual responsible for his
or her own economic destiny. Character flaws and motivational
deficiencies are often seen as the causes of poverty and economic
insecurity, as these student quotes indicate:
People
are rich because they have the know-how and the opportunity,
and to an extent most of them are wealthy because of some type
of motivation that causes them not to settle at one step or
one degree; they wanted to reach higher heights. . .
People
are poor because they are not educated enough to know that
there is something for them out there; that they can make money.
. .
They
are ignorant and uneducated; a lot of them just don't care
. . . they're happy the way they are . . . if you really want
to have some money, you can get it no matter how poor you have
been.3
This
study shows the dark side of cultural beliefs about poverty:
When children internalize the belief in competitive individualism,
they are also learning to adopt a perhaps unjust explanation
of why rewards are distributed unequally and why there is poverty.
1 Cummings, S., & Taebel, D.
1978. "The economic socialization of children: A neo-Marxist
analysis." Social Problems, 26, 198-210.
2 Cummings, S., & Taebel, D.
1978. "The economic socialization of children: A neo-Marxist
analysis." Social Problems, 26, 198-210. p. 205.
3 Cummings, S., & Taebel, D.
1978. "The economic socialization of children: A neo-Marxist
analysis." Social Problems, 26, 198-210. p. 207.
Sociology:
Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life, Fifth Edition
by David M. Newman.
Copyright © 2004
Pine
Forge
Press,
an
Imprint
of
Sage
Publications,
Inc. http://www.pineforge.com/newman5study/
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