Component 2: social class inequality, including patterns in income, wealth and life chances, the concepts of embourgeoisement, proletarianisation, the underclass and the precariat, and debates about the continuing significance of class.

What this dot point is asking

OCR Component 2 examines social class as a source of inequality: the patterns (income, wealth, life chances), the concepts (embourgeoisement, proletarianisation, the underclass, the precariat), and the debate about whether class is still the main division or has declined. It is one of the two essay topics in Section B, so you need theorists and evidence on both sides.

The answer

Patterns of class inequality

Income (the flow of money from work and benefits) and wealth (assets owned) are very unequally distributed, with wealth even more concentrated than income. Class shapes health (poorer groups have lower life expectancy, worse diet and housing), education (the middle class gain more qualifications) and work. Wilkinson and Pickett argue that more unequal societies have worse outcomes across the board, from health to crime.

Key concepts

• Embourgeoisement: the idea that the working class is adopting middle-class lifestyles and values as living standards rise.
• Proletarianisation: the reverse claim that white-collar (middle-class) work has become deskilled and more like routine working-class work.
• The underclass: Murray argues a group below the working class is trapped by welfare dependency and a lack of work ethic, a view critics see as blaming the poor.
• The precariat: Standing describes a growing class of insecure, low-paid workers in precarious jobs (zero-hours contracts, the gig economy).

Reproduction and the debate about class

Bourdieu argues class advantage is reproduced through three forms of capital: economic (money), social (useful networks) and cultural (the knowledge, tastes and language valued by institutions). Middle-class children inherit cultural capital that advantages them at school. Savage's Great British Class Survey reconceives class as a mix of these capitals, identifying new classes such as the "elite" and the "precariat".

The central debate is whether class is the most significant inequality. Marxists say yes; feminists and anti-racists argue gender and ethnicity matter as much; postmodernists (Pakulski and Waters) argue class is declining, replaced by consumption and identity; and intersectional theorists argue class cannot be separated from gender and ethnicity.

Examples in context

A top essay marshals evidence of class shaping life chances, then weighs it against gender, ethnicity and the postmodern challenge, reaching an intersectional judgement.

Try this

Q1. Outline two ways in which wealth and income are unequally distributed. [4 marks]

• What the marker wants. Two points (AO1, two marks each): wealth is more concentrated than income, and a small proportion of the population owns a large share of total wealth, each briefly developed.

Q2. Outline and explain two reasons why class advantage is passed from one generation to the next. [10 marks]

• Cue. Two developed points: economic capital (inherited wealth and private schooling) and cultural capital (Bourdieu, the tastes and language valued by schools), each applied to an example.