The Social Structure Of Poverty

Poverty is a social issue that has affected the world for thousands of years. While countries like the United States of America have worked determinedly to eliminate it, poverty still generally exists. It occurs on many different reasons, but the ways to reduce poverty are also numerous. The United States continues to have a significant percentage of its population living in poverty due to social inequality and unemployment that does not lift all members of the work force to an adequate living wage.
One of the most common things that lead to inequality is social powerlessness. It makes life harder by restricting the opportunities for the advancement that is necessary to lift disadvantaged people from poverty. “The study shows that poor people are active agents in their lives, but are often powerless to influence the social and economic factors that determine their well-being” (“Attacking Poverty 3”).
Poverty can be analyzed in two complementary ways – who and where. By “who,” poverty refers to people based on their gender, race and age; by “where,” poverty refers to the location it is experienced, whether in cities, suburbs or rural areas as well as different parts of the country. Both who and where are relative concepts reflecting the social structure of inequality (Rosen).
In most nations today, inequality—the gap between the rich …show more content…
The role of stable relationships when it comes to child rearing is crucially important to the economic well-being of a woman. Limited salaries impact housing, in particular the quality and location. Education opportunities for the children are affected by where they live, as well as choices to send them to Private schools vs. Public education. Children born to married parents have distinct statistical