Stratification In America Research Articles

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and Timely Bachelor’s Degree Attainment

It is well established that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are linked to health and emotional outcomes. However, less is known about the relationship between ACEs and educational attainment—a potentially important feature of educational stratification in America. Using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), a nationally representative study following 7–12th grade students in the 1994–95 school year, I investigate the link between ACEs and these students’ timely post-secondary attainment. I also explore the role of health and socio-emotional factors as mediators. Results confirm that there is a graded relationship between ACEs and timely bachelor’s degree attainment—an additional ACE decreases the odds of timely bachelor’s degree attainment by about 17%, even after accounting for other related factors. In addition, the findings suggest that general health partially mediates this link.

Ranking Faiths: Religious Stratification in America By James D. Davidson and Ralph E. Pyle Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 2011. 230 pages. $49.95 cloth

Ranking Faiths: Religious Stratification in America By James D. Davidson and Ralph E. Pyle Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. 2011. 230 pages. $49.95 cloth

Ranking faiths: religious stratification in America

Preface Chapter 1: Ranking Faiths Chapter 2: Our Approach Chapter 3: Origins Chapter 4: Persistence and Change: 1787-1899 Chapter 5: Persistence and Change: 1900-2010 Chapter 6: Consequences Chapter 7: Summary and Implications Appendix Notes References Index About the Authors

Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America (review)

Reviewed by: Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America Min Zhou (bio) Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America, by Lingxin Hao. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2007. Ix + 316 pp. $47.50 cloth; $24.95 paper. ISBN-13: 978-0-87154-338-7. Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America is a quantitative study of immigrants' assimilation and their impacts on social and racial inequality in the United States. Using repeated national survey data, Lingxin Hao thoughtfully and meticulously examines the patterns of wealth by various national origins, changes in American race stratification caused by immigration, and implications for assimilation theory and public policy. She argues that contemporary immigrants have changed the class structure of America but not in ways commonly believed. She shows that, while many immigrant groups—Cubans, Jamaicans, Chinese, and others—have acquired more wealth than their native-born coethnics, their progress in America has more to do with structural characteristics—homeland political and educational systems, social reception and treatment by the U.S. society, immigration selectivity, and occupation and residential segregations—than with individual or cultural characteristics. To tell a coherent story about immigrants' assets and wealth inequality in the United States and to account for immigrant-native differences, Hao organizes her book into nine chapters containing 316 pages including sixty-four tables and seventy-four figures. In her introductory chapter, Hao makes a compelling argument that wealth is a better measure than income in capturing immigrants' socioeconomic integration or structural assimilation while gauging more accurately immigration's impact on American society. As a concept, wealth contains assets and debts, absorbing the consequences of past economic behavior and activity, including earning, saving, consuming, portfolio allocating, and investing in children and for old age (2). Drawing on theories of international migration, assimilation, stratification, and wealth accumulation, Hao introduces nativity as a key factor into the racial-ethnic stratification system and conceptualizes the host society as structured by a two-tier race-nativity stratification system in which race stratifies wealth at the primary level and nativity stratifies wealth at the secondary level (chapter 2). She asserts that this two-tier system allows some immigrant groups to transcend color lines and eventually assimilate into the mainstream America while weakening the racial hierarchy. At the same time, many immigrant groups are trapped within the host racial hierarchy. Hao then establishes, step-by-step, the logical linkage between microlevel behavior in motivation, consumption, saving, and lifestyle and macrolevel constraints in wealth accumulation to provide a systematic and comprehensive portrait of [End Page 317] immigrants' wealth over a twenty-year period. She looks closely at the trajectories of both assets and debts in total and specific components by country of origin, family life cycle, and arrival cohort (chapters 3–6). She shows that the existence and salience of a second-tier hierarchy and attributes it to the large variations in the modes of incorporation within different national-origin groups of different racial/ethnic backgrounds. For example, Cuban immigrants make substantially more progress than arrivals from the Dominican Republic, but they do not top whites; Chinese immigrants from Mainland China have more success than Vietnamese or Korean immigrants, but they do not top whites either; and Jamaicans fare better than Haitians and sub-Saharan Africans, but they still fare much worse than whites and some other racial minorities such as Hispanics. Hao provides evidence to show how nativity differences can be subsumed by race-ethnicity and education. For example, while rates of return to education may favor racial minorities, postsecondary degrees earned in developing countries of origin may offset this advantage, which can have varied effects on immigrants of darker or lighter skin color. Hao also shows that a strong motivation to improve life chances of family and a home country culture honoring having children and emphasizing children's education can boost asset building among members of some national origin groups regardless of their current marital and parenthood statuses. In Chapter 7, Hao builds and empirically tests a model of immigrant assimilation through wealth attainment. Her model estimates the strength of racial-ethnic effect and education effect and the strength...

RANKING FAITHS: RELIGIOUS STRATIFICATION IN AMERICA by James D. Davidson and Ralph E. Pyle

RANKING FAITHS: RELIGIOUS STRATIFICATION IN AMERICA by James D. Davidson and Ralph E. Pyle

Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America

Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America

Homeownership Across the American Life Course: Estimating the Racial Divide

Homeownership has historically been viewed as a fundamental piece of the American dream, with up to 67% of households owning their home as of 2010. Yet, it has also been demonstrated that nonwhites are less likely to own a home and that the value of their homes is much less than that for whites, even when social class is taken into account. This paper explores the overall life-course patterns of homeownership and the importance of racial differences in understanding those dynamics. Based upon a life table methodology, we examine the homeownership patterns for individuals between the ages of 25–55 using 36 waves of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Our findings indicate that although the vast majority of nonwhites will eventually become homeowners, there is nevertheless a significant racial divide in the patterns of homeownership. Nonwhites are less likely than whites to become homeowners, are more likely to purchase their first home at a later age, are less likely to have acquired as much equity in their home, and are less likely to own their home outright. The implications of these findings are discussed within the overall context of racial stratification in America.

Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America ‐ by Lingxin Hao

Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America. Lingxin Hao. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. 2007. 316 pp. ISBN 0871543389. $47.50 (cloth). Immigration streams continue to shape and reshape America. The growing immigrant share of the U.S. population generates considerable public discourse about the economic incorporation of immigrants into U.S. society. Much of the research on immigrants' economic wellbeing shows a disproportionate concentration of immigrants near the bottom of American society, but little attention focuses on the other end of the spectrum - wealth accumulation. Wealth is an important indicator of financial well-being. It is a measure of income, plus individuals' financial behaviors (such as propensities to save, consumption patterns, cultural values, investment strategies, and lifestyles) as well as contextual structures that either facilitate or block immigrants' opportunities for upward mobility. In Color Lines, Country Lines: Race, Immigration, and Wealth Stratification in America, Lingxin Hao extensively documents how racial and ethnic stratification constrains immigrants' wealth accumulation. She also persuasively demonstrates how nativity further differentiates the U.S. population and may, over time, contribute to a transformation of the stratification system. Hao integrates both wealth and immigration theory into a combined framework to explain immigrant wealth accumulation. She builds on segmented assimilation theory by incorporating nativity into a two-tiered sorting structure. In this dominance-differentiation perspective, race/ethnicity functions as the primary sorting mechanism and nativity serves as a secondary factor that creates further variation within racial/ethnic groups. The book underlies the importance of immigrants' race/ethnicity for wealth accumulation - similar contextual forces will cause immigrants' wealth accumulation to mirror that of their U.S.-born racial/ethnic counterparts. Yet immigrants' human and social capital as well as cultural values will uniquely contribute to their financial well-being. Hao argues that greater within racial/ethnic group variation (country lines) will help dissolve boundaries between racial/ethnic groups (color lines). As the number of Latino and Asian immigrants continues to grow, Hao contends that stratification between Whites, Latinos, and Asians will lessen as a result of increasing racial/ethnic heterogeneity. Hao pools data from the 1985-2003 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) to create a sample of over 216,000 native-born and almost 23,000 foreign-born respondents. Hao takes advantage of the extensive financial information available in the SIPP data, focusing on net worth and wealth holding status (sufficient, insufficient, asset-poor, net-debtor, paycheck-to-paycheck). Analytically, she applies Tobit techniques to examine positive wealth and account for the censoring of zero or negative wealth values. Hao teases out the racial/ethnic and nativity dimensions by comparing the wealth accumulation of immigrant Latinos, Blacks, and Asians with both U.S.-born Whites and their U.S.-born racial/ethnic counterparts. The book provides a much needed overview of immigrants' financial well-being. Chapter 3 focuses on patterns of wealth attainment by race/ethnicity, education, and nativity. Results support the dominance-differentiation perspective by confirming well-established inequalities by race/ethnicity and revealing similar levels of wealth by nativity for each racial/ethnic group. Indeed, nativity is not a primary stratification factor, but contributes to differences in wealth attainment within racial/ethnic groups. Chapters 4-6 explore Latino, Black, and Asian immigrants in depth. Each chapter begins by discussing country of origin and demographic differences within these immigration streams. Hao then uses multiple wealth measures to explore the financial well-being of each racial/ethnic group relative to both native-born Whites and their same-race/co-ethnic peers. …

Religious Stratification: Its Origins, Persistence, and Consequences*

Sociologists have shown that religious groups can be ranked in terms of their access to power, privilege, and prestige. However, the interpretation of this ranking is in dispute. I raise three questions. (1) Under what conditions does religious stratification arise? (2) How does it persist and change over time? (3) How does it affect society? I approach these questions in much the same way sociologists have studied the origins, persistence, and consequences of stratification based on race, class, and gender. Framing the issues in terms of conflict theory, I summarize what colleagues and I are learning about the development of religious stratification in America's colonial period, how it has persisted and changed since then, and its destabilizing impact on our society. I also discuss the implications our analyses have for future research, including research at the meso- and micro-levels. Given the theme of the 2007 annual meeting, I conclude with a few thoughts about the implications my analysis has for building a better society.

The Origins of Religious Stratification in Colonial America

Religious stratification occurs when religion is institutionalized in the laws and/or customs of society as a criterion for the allocation of social positions and their attendant rewards. The result is a relatively stable ranking of religious groups in terms of their access to power, privilege, and prestige. In this article, we examine the social processes that contributed to the emergence of religious stratification in colonial America. Following Weber (1946), Lenski (1966), and Noel (1968), we use a “modified fair shares” theory that highlights the importance of three contributing influences: religious prejudice, competition, and differential power. After explaining the role played by each of these factors, we document the existence and enduring nature of religious stratification in the colonies. The evidence includes data on the religious establishments that arose in some colonies, other regulations governing access to scarce resources (such as the right to vote and hold public office), and differential access to economic and political power based on religious adherence. We conclude with observations about the need for further research on religious stratification in America.

Rags or Riches? Estimating the Probabilities of Poverty and Affluence across the Adult American Life Span

Objective. Poverty and affluence represent events central to the American identity of failure and success. Yet in spite of their significance, we know little about the actual likelihood of experiencing these events across the adult life course. In this article we empirically estimate the extent to which Americans will experience poverty and/or affluence during their adulthood. Methods. A series of life tables are constructed based upon data from 25 waves of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Our measure of poverty is identical to that used by the U.S. Census Bureau in estimating the overall U.S. poverty rates. Affluence is defined as 10 times the poverty level. Results. Results indicate that between the ages of 25 and 75, 51.1 percent of Americans will experience at least one year below the poverty line, 51.0 percent will encounter a year of affluence, while only 20.1 percent of Americans will avoid either of these economic extremes. The effects of race and education in altering the likelihood of encountering poverty versus affluence are substantial. Conclusions. The opportunities for acute economic failure and success appear to be very real components of the American experience. Based upon this, we discuss an alternative typology to conceptualizing stratification in America.

Book Review: Human Resources, Personnel, and Organizational Behavior: Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America

Book Review: Human Resources, Personnel, and Organizational Behavior: Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America

Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America.

Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America.

Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America

Divided We Stand: Working-Class Stratification in America

Class Awareness in the United States. By Mary R. Jackman and Robert W. Jackman (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983. xi, 231 p. $30.00, cloth; $10.95, paper). - Divided We Stand: Working Class Stratification in America. By William Form (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1985. xviii, 306 p. $28.95).

Class Awareness in the United States. By Mary R. Jackman and Robert W. Jackman (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983. xi, 231 p. 10.95, paper). - Divided We Stand: Working Class Stratification in America. By William Form (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1985. xviii, 306 p. $28.95). - Volume 81 Issue 2

3: One Field, Many Views: Competing Theories of International Migration

3: One Field, Many Views: Competing Theories of International Migration

Development Towns in Israel: The Role of Community in Creating Ethnic Disparities in Labor Force Characteristics

This paper investigates the contribution of community to ethnic stratification is Israel. We show that "development towns," a category of new settlements established to achieve population dispersal and immigrant absorption, have influenced (a) the areal distributions of different ethnic (country-of origin) group, (b) the tendency for each group to be concentrated in certain industries, and (c) the occupational opportunities available to the members of an ethnic population. We also review the relevance of this analysis for understanding ethnic stratification in America.

Nationality Groups and Social Stratification in America

Nationality Groups and Social Stratification in America