

Is Social Inequality a Result of an Individual’s Merits and Failings?

2148 words (9 pages) Essay in Sociology

18/05/20 Sociology Reference this




In this assignment I will be working with the hypothesis “ social inequality is primarily a result of people`s own individual merits and failings  I do agree with the statement “social inequality is primarily a result of people`s individual merits and failings, in my conclusion I will test to see if my hypothesis is true or not.


Social inequality is the presence of inadequate chances and remunerates for different social positions or stages within a group or society. ( It can also be defined as an involuntarily change by which societies make sure that the key positions are diligently filled by the greatest eligible person (David and Moore, 1945).

Social inequality is disconnected from economic imbalance although these two are entwined. It can be in form of the voting rights, freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, the extent of property rights and access to education, health care, eminence housing, migrant, transportation, retreat and other social merchandises and skills. Social inequality can transpire through the discriminatory legislature, cultural or secular groups, brands and countries making the conception of social inequality global occurrences. A society`s tolerant of right gender roles, or through the incidence of social stereotyping.

 Importantly, it disagrees that lifestyles and life choices render greater individual replication and reflexion. Lifestyles are evidently more visibly determined by a person`s choices, character and actions. Adapt in this sense means that each person’s life history is detached from particular factors and prospect in his or her own hands, open and unwavering on the resolution. The part of life prospects which are profoundly close to verdict making is decreasing and the percentage of the autobiography which is open and must be made personally is increasing. The individualisation of life’s situations and processes thus meaning that biographies become self-reflexive. – Beck, 1992

The state in which a person was raised and lived have a lasting impact on their personal and social identities and it influences both the way they think and feels about their social environment and key aspects of their social behaviour. People`s failings can be seen in natives being prejudice towards immigrants because they think they are here to take their jobs away from them. Educated people can be biased towards the immigrants and ethnic minorities if they turned out to be highly refined and they fear they cause economic menace. Some children decide to drop out of school before writing their living certificate.

There are some types of people who are seen as a problem for others or for society at large (even if these people do not define themselves in the same way). For example, we might be able to identify groups of people who are seen to pose a threat or danger to society in some way: hooligans, noisy neighbours, gangsters, prostitutes, the mentally ill, and so on. The demand here is that society does something about ‘these people’ – lock them up, treat them and so forth. (

The middle-class society has admittance to excellent schools, universities and the lower class will not relate to such an organisation knowing the stakes of them being accepted are very slim. People who have never left their home to go and stay in a different environment with new experiences have vague experience of only one society, it is often hard for them to that can be very different from what they have always been exposed to. The way people perform socially, through racist or sexiest practices and other forms of discrimination, manages to filter down and adopt the prospects and wealthy individuals can create for themselves. The eminence of family and neighbourhood life can either inspire or demoralise a person to work hard examples can be a person who grows up in a poor family who lives next to a rich family has the capability of working very hard academically to have what he sees his or her neighbours enjoying. If the motive is wrong the same child can try to be rich using short cuts and end up involved in things like robbery, prostitution or drug dealing just to make money in a quick way. Young people who grow up in families that depend on social welfare will learn to live cultures of worklessness or embrace uncritically welfare dependency. Everyone has the same opportunity to take up training and obtain their skills if they have resources and in Ireland the government helps with grants and funding to people who do not afford to pay fees.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

Social inequality is connected to ethnic inequality, gender inequality and capital inequality. Racial inequality is a gap in opportunity and treatment that transpires as a result of someone`s race. An example is when a Chinese are capable to go to better schools than those of other races because the school can only acknowledge Chinese. ( Another example I can think of in the Irish community, the black community or immigrants face a lot of discrimination when they apply for a front house job.

Gender inequality is official, social and cultural situation in which sex and/or gender define different rights and distinguish for women and men, which are revealed in their uneven entrance to or satisfaction of rights, as well as the notion of categorised social and cultural roles. These disturb their status in all parts of life in society, either public or private, in the family or the work market, in economic or administrative life, in power and making resolutions, as well as in social gender associations. In almost all societies, women are in a lesser position to men.

Wealth inequality – Wealth refers to the overall amount of possessions of an individual or family. This may include financial assets, such as bonds and stocks, property and private pension rights. Wealth inequality can also refer to the uneven distribution of assets in a group of people.

There are some benefits that come along with social inequality such as motivation effect it has on a person when he or she is rewarded for the hard working. It can be in form of an increase in incomes and renumerations or promotion it inspires and influences the person to put in extra effort and it benefits both the person and a boost to productivity which can be a higher national output.

It encourages people to take risks and set up businesses a lot of business were created after entrepreneurs saw the gap and necessity in the society of definite goods and commodities.

It encourages equality. you only get what you work for, and a highly skilled worker deserves a higher income if their skills merit it.

Social inequality motivates people to work very hard in order to get more money. If there is income equality people will not work hard or study. It helps people to earn success through their own potential.

 Although there is a good side of social inequality it also has a bad prejudical on the society it promotes crimes, people partaking in riots, unfair sharing of prospects to citizens. Inherited wealth promotes unfairness to people and makes some lazy than others since they can easily satisfy all their needs with less effort. It promotes political inequality were political powers are always in favour of the rich people it usually results in a lot of corruption and oppression of the poor.

Conclusion.    When I started this assignment I had a hypothesis that Social inequality is a personal choice, but after reading and researching on the internet my hypothesis has not changed. I have gained some understanding that society inequality is not only a result of personal merits and failings, but some things also will never be a person`s control it is beyond their control. I have come to the conclusion that one can really understand one`s own society by comparing it with the experience gained from other societies. It is created, reproduced, established, authenticated and maintained by the people who hold the most resources in society. Lastly Society inequality is very different in different countries.



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