Essay Sample on Inequality in America: The Rich vs. Poor Divide

In the modern digitalized world, one of the most significant social concerns regarding wealth, income, and class within American society is the issue of inequality. Throughout the last few decades, the gap between the income of the various social classes has increased drastically, resulting in an immense difference between the rich and the poor (Giordono, Jonesm& Rothwell, 2019). The dispute has, however, steadily become substantial such that the middle class has almost diminished, contributing to a social level primarily comprising of the wealthy and the poor. The existing inequality concerning the income in America is therefore unhealthy, especially for the lower levels because it gives too much power to the individuals holding high social status. Ideally, the indication that income inequality has been increasing at an alarming rate in the United States as compared to other developed democracies is not in any way disputed since it is widely researched and extensively known (Giordono, Jonesm& Rothwell, 2019). The income inequality has enormously been an academic specialty for decades as it is perceived to be a threat to the fundamental growth of the American economy. As such, the chief aim of this paper is to critically discuss some of the significant contributing factors or reasons for the increase in inequality in the United States over the last century with a particular focus in the technology expansion that has changed education as well as deindustrialization, which is one major cause of the widening income inequality and high rates of unemployment. Indeed, despite its massive wealth, America has a significant number of individuals living in poverty that other developed nations, and this can substantially be attributed to the fact that different levels of people are paid different wages.

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According to the article "Why is America so Unequal," there are several reasons why America is considered as one of the unequal nations within the developed world (Chapter 9). One significant factor is the increasingly and swiftly transforming connection between technological expansion and education. (Chapter 9). The technology advent contributes to the inequality in it significantly complements several occupations while completely replacing others.

A specific example is how the development of computer networking has effectively impacted the banking sector, whereby the number of cashiers or teller have reduced due to the introduction of online access to bank services. Equally important, the transformation in technology has also created more job opportunities in the bank, for instance, a specialized sales-oriented financial analyst with an MBA (Chapter 9). Generally, the technology matches occupations that are associated with higher levels of education, such as Masters's degrees or college degrees, whereas it swaps those jobs that require low levels of education.

From the social scientists' perspective, this job replacement is regarded as skill-biased technological change, also known as SBTC, implying that technology advances have resulted in more occupations that need specialized skills (Chapter 9). The SBTC has, however, caused increased inequality, especially to the extent in which education expands to fulfill the demands of the new technology. Therefore, when the number of graduates increases at a similar pace as the technology, the education systems with being able to satisfy the needs of the growing economy. However, the primary reason why this has contributed to inequality in the United States is that the higher education sector has not developed at the same rate as technology development. Consequently, graduates have become scarcer concerning the economy requirements, and as a result, they are paid higher wages. According to researchers is that when technology increases at a higher rate, the education expansion does not complement the technological skills needed at the workplace, and thus the college premiums increases, and this is precisely what is happening in America, resulting in inequality (Chapter 9). Growth in technology is, therefore, an essential contributing factor as it inarguably causes joblessness at various skill levels. Computers perform significant works for unskilled workers, where they work even more effectively and efficiently. The constant technological development in artificial intelligence can eventually enable robots or machines to undertake some of the knowledge-based careers.

Additionally, de-industrialization is another major cause of the increasing concern of inequality, significantly described as a constant decline in employment within the manufacturing and other huge industries (Giordono, Jonesm& Rothwell, 2019). Ideally, a steady decline in industrial jobs has been experienced in America. In contrast, at the same time, the service jobs have significantly increased, for instance, in the finance, healthcare, and retail sectors. (Chapter 9). Globalization can be said to be the primary cause of the rapid decrease of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. primarily because various services jobs have grown recently, attracting more people even though they are all low wages as compared to the manufacturing jobs (Chapter 9). At the center of globalization is also what is referred to as outsourcing, which has become a common occurrence in the manufacturing sector, for instance, various components can be generated in different parts of the world with only the final assembly taking place in America. Since the developing nations often produce products at a lower cost, trade depresses the salaries of the low domestic laborers who manufacturers these products.

References

Chapter 9. "Why Is America so Unequal? Social Stratification, Inequality, and Poverty".

Giordono, L. S., Jones, M. D., & Rothwell, D. W. (2019). Social Policy Perspectives on Economic Inequality in Wealthy Countries. Policy Studies Journal, 47, S96-S118.