PATTERNS & TRENDS

Question 1

What trends can be identified in income distribution? (I)

Answer 1

There was a slight narrowing of income inequalities, but during the 1980s, inequalities in income rose sharply.

Question 2

What are the four forms of wealth defined by the ONS? (W)

Answer 2

• Property Wealth.
• Physical Wealth.
• Financial Wealth.
• Private Pension Wealth.

Question 3

What did the 2012 annual Sunday Times Rich List suggest about wealth in the UK? (W)

Answer 3

The richest 200 families had between them total wealth averaging £225 billion.

Question 4

Give two problems with measuring wealth. (W)

Answer 4

• Calculating the value of assets is difficult.

- Obtaining data about wealth is not easy.

Question 5

How much of the wealth in the UK belongs to the poorest 50%?

Answer 5

Have only 10% of the wealth of the UK between them.

Question 6

What does research from Atkinson reveal about social class and wealth?

Answer 6

Reveals an increasing proportion of national income now comes from inherited wealth.

Question 7

What is absolute poverty?

Answer 7

A lack of basic essentials needed to survive physically; these include adequate food, clothing, housing and fuel.

Question 8

What is relative poverty?

Answer 8

Judging whether a person’s income is so far below that expected by the majority of people in society that they are excluded from a normal lifestyle.

Question 9

What does the HBAI define low income as being?

Answer 9

Below 60% of the median.

Question 10

What did the Trussell Trust suggest about food poverty in 2014?

Answer 10

4.7 million people were in food poverty.

Question 11

What are the two ways that sociologists measure social mobility? (SM)

Answer 11

1. Intergenerational mobility - mobility between generations.
2. Intragenerational mobility - movement between classes by an individual during their working life.

Question 12

What is an open society?

And what is a closed society?

Answer 12

Open: great deal of social mobility.
Closed: little or no social mobility.

Question 13

Give two problems of researching social mobility.

Answer 13

• Studying the mobility of women. E.g. Goldthorpe focused only on male heads of households.
• Classifying occupations. Sociologists do not agree on how people should be classified by occupation.

Question 14

What did Goldthorpes Oxford Mobility Study show about the period after WW2?

Answer 14

There had been considerable upward mobility. One possible explanation for this was the introduction of free secondary education after 1944.

Question 15

Who did Goldthorpe study in the Oxford Mobility Study?

Answer 15

10,000 men.

Question 16

What Saunders’ state in criticism of the Oxford Mobility Study?

Answer 16

Argued that we should focus on absolute rather than relative mobility rates.

Question 17

What does feminists Stanworth and Abbott argue about the Oxford Mobility Study?

Answer 17

Criticised its focus only on men.

Goldthorpe argued that there was no need to research women as in most households men were the main wage-earners.

Question 18

What does Savage and Egerton’s NCDS study show about social mobility in Britain?

Answer 18

The study was based on the class that people had reached by 1991. Unliked the OMS, it included the mobility of women.

Question 19

What does research Wilkinson and Pickett demonstrate about countries with the highest levels of income inequality?

Answer 19

Also have the lowest levels of social mobility.

Question 20

What did the bsa state about identification with class?

Answer 20

60% considered themselves ‘working-class’ while 40% considered themselves ‘middle-class’.

Question 21

What did the SMC state about class inequality in work and employment?

Answer 21

Even when people from disadvantaged backgrounds land a professional job, they earn 17% less than their privileged colleagues.

Question 22

How much less were individuals who were on free school meals paid after graduation in comparison to those who were not?

Answer 22

Five years after graduating, students who were eligible for free school meals were paid 11.5% less than their peers.

Question 23

What did the SMC find about social mobility since 2014?

Answer 23

Social mobility has remained virtually stagnant since 2014.