Social Inequalities In America

Inequality of Social Classes in United States Democracy While United States is one of the most powerful and successful countries in the world, it has many flaws in need of attention. One of the most prominent issues is the unequal representation of citizens in the government. Many factors contribute to this, but one significant cause of inequality is the representation of social classes. Even in the 1800s, Alexis De Tocqueville determined that the social class that held the most power would pass policies in their own favor (1835). Because of separation between social classes, the upper class has the most influence in government, the middle class is decently represented, and the lower class has a weak effect in democracy. Evidence shows that
the United States upper class make up a small percentage of the population, especially the “super rich” who have a significant amount of power in the government. Representatives and politicians are members of the upper class. The middle class makes up almost half of the population, but it has been steadily decreasing according to recent studies. This results in greater economic inequality. The lower class is growing, but they do not have as much representation in government due to a lack of education and money. All these factors contribute to the poor representation of many U.S. citizens. The upper class has the most say in government policies, and their preferences are given too much priority. An analysis of social classes done by Pew Research Center shows that the upper class makes up about 21% of the U.S. population or about one fifth (2015). Upper class people approximately make over $100,000 per year (Francis, 2012). Members of Congress, in both the US Senate and US House of Representatives, make at least $174,000 a year (Brudnick, 2014). This makes them upper class. The smallest class currently has the most power in the democracy. After examining 1,779 policy outcomes for over 20 years, Martin Gillens and Benjamin Page determine that “economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence” (Bartels, 2014). Additionally, the large salary provides incentive for a person to run for a position in the democracy. A politician may not care about the position or have ideas of changes they strongly want to implement in order improve people’s representation. Some politicians run for office for the benefits and money. This hinders equal representation because they value personal advantage more than the wishes of the people. Also, according to Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, banks and financial institutions like Wall Street are more influential on government actions than the common people, saying “politics has become subservient to economic and financial interests.” (2011). Wall Street has grown more powerful in recent years and reached 37% of the GDP in 2013. This increased their influence on the government. For example, finance, real estate, and insurance spent $485 million on lobbying and $149 million on donations to federal campaigns. Lobbying means seeking influence on a politician or an issue (Mukunda, 2014). This shows just how significantly Wall Street controls the United States democracy. The middle class has been shrinking, increasing the degree of economic variation. In Pew Research Center’s analysis, 1971 the middle class was 61% of the population, but this decreased to 54% by 2001. In 2015 it continued the decline at just under 50%. The upper class went from 14% in 1971 to 21% in 2015, and the lower class increased as well from 25% to 29% respectively (2015). There are now more people on either end of the spectrum, and the middle ground is thinning out. This decrease in economic equality makes it more difficult for the democracy to accommodate the needs of the classes, which are completely different, while still treating people equally. It becomes increasingly difficult to represent each citizen because of the great variety of circumstances individuals from different classes deal with. Another of Pew Research Center’s studies shows that there are 203 metropolitan areas with a decrease in the middle class living there (2016). Many of the people who were in middle class are either getting richer or getting poorer. Pew Research Center also collected data on the opinions of middle class about their satisfaction with government interaction. 62% of the middle class believes the government does not do enough for them (2016). This majority dissatisfaction with the democratic government reveals that the people are not satisfied with their representation, even in the middle class. The lower class has the worst representation of the three classes.
Due to the government favoring the upper class, the needs of the poor and struggling lower class do not get the attention they need. In his book, White-Collar Government, Nicholas Carnes explains, “The effects on the well-being of working-class Americans are staggering. Business regulations are more relaxed, tax policies are more generous to the rich, social safety net programs are stingier, and protections for workers are weaker than they would be if our political decision makers came from the same mix of classes as the people they represent” (2013). His book also mentions that eight of the last twelve presidents were millionaires before coming into office (Carnes, 2013). The U.S.’s presidents often come from the most affluent people in the country, but presidents with a poor background have rarely emerged in our recent history. Politicians who have experienced the lower class understand the issues pertaining to them, and they are more sympathetic and proactive for the benefit of the U.S. lower class. Jacob Grumbach explains, “politicians hailing from working-class jobs can do a great deal to make American politics and policy more responsive to the needs of the average citizen … because they will likely do more than other privileged officeholders to advocate policies that expand economic opportunities for all Americans” (2015). Because previously privileged politicians do not vie as much for the wellbeing
of the lower class and because they make up the majority of democratic representatives, they do not accurately represent the people. In a statistical analysis, “the collective preferences of ordinary citizens had only a negligible estimated effect on policy outcomes, while the collective preferences of “economic elites” (roughly proxied by citizens at the 90th percentile of the income distribution) were 15 times as important” (Bartels, 2014). The needs and wants of the lower class are not given equal significance in democratic affairs. Some may argue that class distinction is not a factor in unequal representation.
People argue that the dominance of the upper class in politics does not cause them to poorly represent the lower class. Patrick Flavin argues this because he analyzes to see if as public opinion becomes more conservative across the states, elected officials voting behavior also become more conservative. He then compares the responsiveness with different amounts of rich and poor voter turnout. He concludes that an increase in voter turnout of the lower class does not improve representation (2012). While the amount of poor voter turnout may not be the cause of bad representation, they still are not well represented. Pew Research Center gathered data showing that the most financially struggling usually support democratic candidates more than republican. This shows elected representatives might be more republican than the public wants (2015). If the representatives are not equally derived from the different classes, there can still not be accurate representation. Regardless of the amount of poor who vote, upper class representatives will not be as motivated to benefit the lower class. Joshua Kalla and David Brookman conducted a field experiment on access to members of congress in which political organization contacted 191 congressional offices requesting meetings to discuss a pending bill. They randomly identified the organization’s members as either constituents or as campaign donors. The results
showed that of “the people identified as donors, 19 percent got meetings with the member of Congress or a top staffer, but only 5 percent of those identified as constituents (not as donors) got similar access” (Bartels, 2014). This shows the bias in democracy, and the corruption of congressmen. Additionally, Adam Berinsky uses studies of welfare opinion and polls to show that exclusion bias may result in “significantly distorted measures of opinion” as yet another example of flaws in representation (2002). While Flavin’s evidence may show that the amount of lower class votes make little difference in overall representation, this does not necessarily support the conclusion that they are well represented in spite of poor voting turnout. In conclusion, the United States democracy does not equally represent its people. There are different levels of representation, depending upon which class a citizen falls into, from the overly represented upper class to the more powerless lower class. Until these differences in representation are resolved, the people in each social class cannot have equal opportunity.