Family and the Economy

Chapter 9

The Significance of Work

• Work is a physical or mental activity that accomplishes or produces either goods or services. – How did work change during the industrial

revolution-Advent of capitalism• Economy? Types of economic systems– Being employed leads to a sense of

accomplishment and helps give us an identity.– The ideas of Karl Marx

Work in the Contemporary United States

• Deindustrialization

• Globalization

• Offshoring

How the Economy Affects Families-Contemporary Trends

• Low wage jobs• Part time work/Contingency work• Downsizing• Unemployment• Poverty• Homelessness– The new homeless

• Who comes to mind when you think of a typical poor person?

Income Distribution and Families

• Poverty– Absolute poverty– Relative poverty

• The poverty line?

• Growing inequality in income and wealth– The shrinking middle class– CEO compensation

Growing Inequality in the U.S.

Effects of Poverty on Marriages and Families

• Physical health• Mental health• Personal and marital satisfaction• Life span• Most common relational problem?– How does poverty affect a child’s life• U.S. has highest child poverty rate of wealthy nations

• Why do Americans tolerate such massive concentrations of income and wealth and high levels of poverty?

– Are the richest American families the hardest working?

– Do CEO’s deserve what they get paid?

The American Dream is one of the most powerful concepts and constructions in American society

The land of opportunity

Meritocracy

“Rags to Riches”

Effects of Employment on Spouses

• Money as power

• Working Wives– Dual Earner marriages– The mommy track

• Wives who “opt out”

Two-Income Families

Dual-Earner versus Dual-Career Families– In dual-earner couples, both partners work outside the

home. These couples make up about 55% of the all married couples. Despite their dual incomes, dual earner families are rarely affluent.

– In dual-career families, both partners work in professional or managerial positions that require extensive training or a long-term commitment. The better educated the couple, the more hours they work.

Three Types of Dual-career Marriages

• HER /his career– Where the wife’s career takes precedence.

• HIS/her career– Where the husband’s career takes precedence.

• HIS/HER career– When the careers of both partners are given equal

status in the relationship.

Effects of Employment on Children

• Do mothers who work outside the home have a negative effect on their children?

Effects of Employment on Children

• “Quality” Time

• Day care considerations– Quality– Cost

Balancing Work and Family

• Gender and Balance

• Role conflict

• Superwoman/Supermom– The “Second shift”– The “Third Shift”

Global Poverty and The Sociological Imagination

• Half of developing world live on less than $2 a day (2 billion people) and ¼ live in extreme poverty (less than $1.25 per day)– Sub-Saharan Africa– Tremendous inequality between nations and

within nations-The richest 1 percent in the world own 40% of global household wealth; the richest 2% own more than half of global wealth; and the richest 10% own 85% of total global wealth.

Poverty-Why?

• Why do other industrialized/wealthy nations have lower rates of poverty for female headed families?• Family Friendly Policies?