Deck 5: Social Inequality and Labor

Question 1

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
According to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, capitalism would lead to conflict between two social classes:

A) the people who profit from the ownership of property and the people who work for a wage or a salary
B) the people living in industrialized nations and the people in non-industrialized societies
C) the people with valuable skills and the people with few or no marketable skills
D) farmers and urban workers
E) wage earners and the unemployed

Answer 1

A

Question 2

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
In Thompson's essay what term is NOT used to describe the work?

A) dehumanizing
B) monotonous
C) dishonest
D) dangerous

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
In order to write the essay, Ehrenreich:

A) left her home and family and "posed" as a person with few skills or resources in order to get a menial, low-income job
B) interviewed more than a dozen women who had dropped out of high school
C) obtained permission to sit in on meetings with government administrators and social workers
D) drew on her personal experiences as a single mother who lived on welfare and did low-wage work while her children were growing up
E) Ehrenreich did all these in order to write her essay

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
When Marx and Engels looked at societies in the past and present, they saw:

A) war and perpetual fighting between armies
B) a machine that could produce abundance
C) an organism of interdependent parts, all working for a common goal
D) social divisions between the powerful and those who served the powerful

Question 5

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
What job did Ehrenreich plan not to do, but ended up doing?

A) hotel clerk
B) waitress
C) private security guard
D) teacher's aid in a classroom
E) door-to-door retail cosmetic salesperson

Question 6

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
What do Marx and Engels think will happen when those who own the economy can no longer effectively manage the forces they have created?

A) society will collapse and people will return to a "state of nature"
B) they will recognize their errors and shift their attention to protecting the environment
C) workers will take over and run the economy for the good of everyone in society
D) technology and information systems will take over and do the work of managing the economy

Question 7

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
According to Ehrenreich:

A) most people in the low-wage economy steal from their employers and/or lie about their hours, resulting in a much higher net income than they would otherwise receive
B) only a small minority of people in the low-wage economy are actually trying to support themselves or their families on their income alone
C) it is nearly impossible to live on a minimum- or low-wage income, even if you work full time
D) the combination of welfare payments and unreported, untaxed income allows "poor people" to live quite comfortably

Question 8

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
The two biggest problems Ehrenreich found in the low-wage workforce were:

A) managers who bullied or enforced dehumanizing rules, and the impossibility of living on such low wages
B) drug abuse among employees, and customers who had no respect for employees
C) high payroll taxes, and getting to work on time
D) getting fellow employees to work hard, and finding managers who cared about their responsibilities

Question 9

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
Thompson's essay is about whom?

A) high school dropouts who "pass" as graduates (sometimes even posing as college graduates in the high-tech field)
B) socially privileged women (and a few men) who use their privilege to get jobs for which they are not qualified; they "talk themselves" into a job, then "hang themselves" by their incompetence
C) immigrants to the United States who succeed by working hard and saving their money, while those around them (mostly young Americans) fail
D) people who think they will continue their education but become "'trapped'" in a job and the debts of family life

Question 10

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
Thompson based this essay on:

A) reports by government (state and USDA) inspectors
B) a sociology professor's participant observation study
C) several visits to a worksite and interviews with employees in their homes
D) the personal experiences of the author while going to college
E) All of the above were "data" for Thompson

Question 11

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
The "trick" of getting everything done and being able to take scheduled breaks proved to be:

A) periodically working at a frenzied pace in order to "get ahead"
B) pretending everything important had been done, even when it hadn't
C) "blowing off" much of the routine work and concentrating on the "bangers" that catch people's attention
D) stuffing unfinished work in a bag and doing it at home at night, bringing it back the next day
E) changing the charge slips in such a way that less work was required in order to meet a quota

Question 12

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
Marx and Engels argue that the modern ruling class has created the conditions for its own destruction and that:

A) nuclear war is inevitable
B) the working class they (the ruling class) created will become their grave-diggers
C) only women and female intuition can pull society back from the brink of collapse
D) democracy will inevitably give way to authoritarian rule

Question 13

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
What kind of work does Thompson describe?

A) work in an shoe factory
B) work in an electronics firm
C) work in a slaughter and meatpacking plant
D) work in a local radio station

Question 14

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
Barbara Ehrenreich undertook the study on which she based the essay "Nickled and Dimed" in order to:

A) calculate how much work people do in the "informal economy" that is not taxed
B) find out how much waste and fraud goes on in government bureaucracies
C) compare unionized workers' jobs to those of non-unionized workers
D) see how former welfare recipients were able to survive without cash benefits

Question 15

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
Ehrenreich concludes from her study that:

A) the low-wage economy perpetuates poverty
B) President Clinton's 1996 welfare reform was a necessary and humane solution to welfare dependency and fraud
C) the minimum wage should be eliminated in order to let market forces, not government, determine how much people should be paid
D) there should be more childcare help for low-wage mothers with young children
E) most people can emerge from poverty ("free themselves of welfare") by working hard
24) Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS

Question 16

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
According to the law, if a waitress's tips and salary fall below the minimum wage:

A) the employer is required to make up the difference
B) no taxes can be deducted from her salary
C) her salary must be raised to the minimum wage level for at least a month
D) she can do nothing, since she is responsible for her (lack of) tips

Question 17

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
Ehrenreich found that the want ads in the newspaper were:

A) filled with opportunities for people with job experience and education, but few for unskilled people like herself
B) not a good indicator of jobs that were actually available
C) the best place to go in search of a job-they were usually timely and accurate
D) highly deceptive, often attracting people to illegal activities or offering a pathway to illegal work

Question 18

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
According to Marx and Engels, those who control the economy of a capitalist society:

A) are inherently conservative and cautious about social and economic change
B) have no interest in politics or power, but are content only to make money
C) live very affluent lifestyles and frequently present themselves as celebrities
D) are constantly in search of new global markets
E) All of the above are characteristics of those controlling the capitalist economy

Question 19

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America BARBARA EHRENREICH
After two weeks "in the field" Ehrenreich tried to:

A) get a short-term bank loan
B) sell a magazine article she had written
C) do two low-wage jobs
D) borrow money from her ex-husband
E) earn money as a prostitute

Question 20

Manifesto of the Communist Party KARL MARX and FRIEDRICH ENGELS
Which nineteenth-century scholar argued that social change is driven by economic power rather than ideas, religion, beliefs, or values?

A) Karl Marx
B) George Herbert Mead
C) Emile Durkheim
D) Friedrich Nietzsche
E) Max Weber
25) Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E.
THOMPSON

Question 21

"Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES c
Waitresses, according to Greta Foff Paules, often:

A) present an image of themselves as being needy and happy with a tip of any size
B) incorrectly record a diner's order, making it smaller than it actually should be, in order to win the diner's favor and increase their own tips
C) see the customer as something to be "processed" in order to get the largest possible tips
D) frequently keep tips intended for other waitresses
E) waitresses do all of the above, according to Greta Foff Paules

Question 22

"Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES c
Paules describes how:

A) managers often sexually harass waitresses, assuming that the waitress will not protest for fear of loosing her job
B) the culture of food and eating in American society is perfectly expressed in the waitress/customer relationship
C) waitresses use various strategies to "make" rather than just "get" a tip
D) males serving tables in a restaurant receive substantially smaller tips from men and females serving tables receive smaller tips from women

Question 23

"Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES c
The relationship among waitresses could best be described as:

A) competitive
B) cooperative
C) hostile
D) indifferent
E) sisterly

Question 24

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
Most people who study deviance, including Chambliss, recognize that:

A) what is deviant and not deviant is usually defined by those who have power in a society
B) deviant behavior is closely linked to (and can often be explained by) mental illness
C) deviants are people who reject conventional definitions of success
D) deviants are among the most creative members of the society
E) All of the above are true and discussed in Chambliss's essay

Question 25

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
Who is the primary subject of Katherine Benton-Cohen's essay, "Borderline Americans?"

A) the unemployed and disabled whose inability to work makes them subject to social disapproval
B) the ultra-rich "jet set" who have homes across the globe and whose wealth comes from the global economic system, not a business located in one locale
C) people, including long-time citizens, living in the Southwest who are of Mexican descent
D) children born in the United States whose parents reside in the country illegally, some because they have overstayed their visas but others because they entered the country without one

Question 26

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
In Chambliss's study, he observed that:
A) the saints were female and the roughnecks were males

A) the young people were saints in their parents' and teachers' eyes and roughnecks in their own eyes
B) the saints were upper-middle-class youth and the roughnecks were working-class and poor youth
C) the young people were saints by day and roughnecks by night and on the weekend

Question 27

"Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES c
Low tips or failing to be tipped at all is interpreted by waitresses as:

A) a consequence of the customer's being too cheap, too poor, or too ignorant to tip properly
B) a personal failure on their part
C) the fault of the restaurant for not making customers comfortable and happy enough to tip
D) the result of a bad economy and hard times for working families

Question 28

Upward Mobility Through Sport? D. STANLEY EITZEN
Eitzen argues that:

A) whites are more likely to be upwardly mobile through sports than are blacks
B) very few individuals actually experience upward mobility as a consequence of successful sports careers while they are in school
C) sports have been the major avenue for minorities to obtain equality in this society
D) athletic success is a major stepping stone to other kinds of success, especially professionally

Question 29

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
The title of Chambliss's essay describes:

A) two gangs who gave themselves these names and emblazoned them on their jackets
B) two prison cliques-one black and one Chicano
C) two cross-town high schools who vied for the title of best partiers
D) two groups or cliques of students from the same school
E) the roles Chambliss assigns to partners in homosexual relationships

Question 30

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
Benton-Cohen points out that:

A) economic prosperity is based on hard work and savings, not insuring that everybody gets what they want
B) "whiteness" was never an issue in ethnic relations in the U.S. Southwest. The issue has always been one of the legality and illegality of those who come to this country
C) assigning people to a particular ethnic group, even one that never before existed, is often the outcome of political and economic competition
D) unions generally benefit those workers who already have the best situation, and they do nothing for those workers who have the greatest needs and worst working conditions
27) "Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES

Question 31

Upward Mobility Through Sport? D. STANLEY EITZEN
The sports sociologist Harry Edwards has said that becoming a successful professional athlete is less likely than getting struck by lightning. According to Eitzen, Edwards is:

A) deliberately wrong because Edwards is a vocal critic of professional sports
B) comparing apples and oranges. Lightning strikes are random events; sport success is based entirely on human effort
C) using faulty data; Eitzen's data shows that Edwards's figures underestimate sport success by at least half
D) probably right
29) The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS

Question 32

"Getting" and "Making" a Tip (from Dishing It Out: Power and Resistance among Waitresses in a New Jersey Restaurant) GRETA FOFF PAULES c
Paules's argument attributes waitresses' success in getting larger tips to:

A) treating the customers with courtesy and friendliness
B) flirting with customers and appearing to be very familiar with complete strangers
C) serving as many customers as possible in a given shift
D) providing an image of someone who really needs the tip and will spend the money sensibly
E) None of the above. It is almost entirely a matter of competence and hard work

Question 33

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
Thompson sees the workers' purchases-cars, vans, motorcycles, etc.-as:

A) a symbol of their solidarity and common identity with one another
B) the fruits of their labor
C) an effort to assimilate into American culture, since most were originally from Latin America and Asia
D) a coping mechanism-substitutes for their low status and undesirable jobs
E) a sign of status aspiration and a desire to have a better life than their parents

Question 34

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
In Benton-Cohen's essay, what is meant by "a true American?"

A) anyone born in the U.S. or who is a naturalized citizen
B) someone who is married, works contentedly, is a homeowner, and is of Northern European descent
C) someone who shares the values and ideals of "Americanism" and a love for the Constitution, no matter where they live
D) people who fight for their country or in other ways make the country stronger and safer
E) anyone living in North or South America

Question 35

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
When the IWW union wanted to organize the miners around Bisbee, Arizona, what happened?

A) the sheriff and hundreds of temporary deputies rounded them up at gunpoint and sent them in railroad cars into the desert more than a hundred miles away
B) the United Mine Workers organized the miners instead, forming a union that continues today
C) at first the mine owners objected and threatened to fight the union, but then bribed the IWW officials into leaving quietly
D) the miners were arrested, imprisoned, and some were executed

Question 36

Hanging Tongues: A Sociological Encounter with the Assembly Line WILLIAM E. THOMPSON
How does Thompson analyze the phenomena of workers washing themselves where they shouldn't and not discarding materials that should be discarded?

A) cultural difference-their culture is one of cleanliness and saving, even when it may be against the rules
B) a mild form of sabotage, rebellion against management's rules, and an effort to avoid more work
C) environmental awareness and an effort to have a smaller impact on resource use
D) efforts to undermine the company by inviting lawsuits against it for selling unsafe and unclean products
26) From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN

Question 37

Upward Mobility Through Sport? D. STANLEY EITZEN
Eitzen focuses on which sport in his article?

A) baseball
B) golf
C) basketball
D) football
E) Eitzen talks about college and professional sports generally, instead of focusing on any particular sport

Question 38

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
The recent angry rhetoric and fearful concerns about immigrants that have led to contentious state legislation is a reminder that:

A) the government has never effectively addressed the problem of people crossing borders illegally
B) when people are worried, their sense of fear and fairness may be expressed by emphasizing racial and ethnic differences between themselves and others
C) morality, and not laws, will ultimately solve social problems
D) history is bound to repeat itself, no matter what we do

Question 39

From Borderline Americans: Racial Divisions and Labor War in the Arizona Borderlands KATHERINE BENTON-COHEN
What is the dual-wage system described by Benton-Cohen?

A) the practice of paying workers a very low official wage that is taxed at a low rate and another wage "under the table" that is not taxed at all
B) the widespread practice of paying Mexican Americans less than white workers for the same work or the exclusion of Mexican Americans from higher-paying jobs
C) wages for doing work in the mines: if the work is dangerous, workers get a second wage based on the level of danger involved
D) another name for wages and benefits, the latter being a "wage" that pays for insurance and pensions which workers don't see until they are injured, sick, or retire

Question 40

Upward Mobility Through Sport? D. STANLEY EITZEN
By questioning the dominant ideology about sports, Eitzen , shows how:

A) the spectacular financial success of a few athletes does not reflect the situation of most athletes
B) ambition is less important than natural ability for success in sports
C) poverty and a tough upbringing create a strong motivation to succeed, including in sports
D) immigrant groups shed their identity as belonging to an ethnic or national minority (e.g. Jewish, Mexican American, black) as soon as they achieve widespread success in sports

Question 41

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
In Gans's essay, the "underclass" is:

A) creative and entrepreneurial people who provide the energy of economic growth, but can never wrest control of the economy from those who inherited their wealth
B) a misguided or inappropriate term that falsely describes persistently poor people who appear to have put themselves in their impoverished position through behavior that they are unwilling to change
C) any immigrant group that begins at the bottom of the stratification system and pushes its way into the middle class
D) the invisible middle class-unrecognized in society but paying most of the taxes

Question 42

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
In general, Gans sees the use of the term "undeserving" as a(n):

A) mark of pride
B) illegal intrusion into the privacy of people's lives
C) shorthand reference to men who abandon their families-that is, "deadbeat dads"
D) stigma
E) a scientific concept that helps focus research on features of society most in need of study

Question 43

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
At the end of his essay, Gans makes clear that being a single parent is:

A) a sign of moral breakdown by subcultural groups
B) not inherently harmful to individuals or society-the harm comes from the fact that poverty so often accompanies single-parent status
C) much better than being single when someone is past the age of 35
D) harder on the non-custodial parent than on the parent with whom the children live

Question 44

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
The Saints and the Roughnecks turned out:

A) pretty much the same, except for those individuals who left the community as adults
B) the opposite of what the community expected; the Roughnecks became community leaders and the Saints never amounted to much of anything
C) pretty much as people expected; most of the Saints finished college and some of the Roughnecks went to prison
D) to be the same people. Chambliss is describing one group as seen from two different sociological perspectives, but this isn't revealed until the end of the essay
30) The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON

Question 45

The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON
Wilson bases his examination of inner-city black males on all of the following research approaches EXCEPT:

A) ethnographic research that he and his team of researchers have conducted for many years
B) studies on inner-city black males by other researchers
C) survey research and other data, much of it reported in scholarly articles and books
D) statements of inner-city black males gathered by the U.S. Department of Labor's decennial survey of joblessness and the low-wage job market
31) Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS

Question 46

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
In his essay, Gans describes how:

A) many people prefer to live in poverty, despite its hardships and social disapproval
B) half of all poor make no effort to improve their situation, despite the efforts of governments, churches, and communities to help
C) the non-poor benefit in many ways from the existence of poverty and poor people
D) many of the most famous and successful people we know have come from families in poverty

Question 47

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
The idea of an "undeserving poor" allows all of the following EXCEPT:

A) a small minority of the poor, especially a very visible ethnic group, to receive special privileges
B) the non-poor to feel no responsibility for the plight of the poor or the social processes that generate poverty
C) employers and government agencies to ignore many poor people as being "unemployable," thus freeing people from the obligation to find solutions to the poor's employment problems
D) the non-poor to show respect for a social norm that they don't actually follow in their own lives

Question 48

The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON
William Julius Wilson's essay on inner-city black males primarily examines their:

A) unwillingness to accept the responsibilities of fatherhood
B) problems getting decent jobs
C) high incarceration rate
D) drug abuse and participation in the illegal drug economy
E) poor record of completing school and low academic achievement scores

Question 49

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
The Saints are characterized by Chambliss as:

A) socially respectable until out of sight of those with whom they were familiar; then they were socially disruptive-though with cops they remained respectful
B) conformist and overly concerned with how others saw them
C) having a strong concern for the welfare of others, especially others at school
D) deeply religious, to the point of designing religious cloaks that they wore to school
E) the name given to girls who participated in an "abstinence only" birth control program

Question 50

The Saints and the Roughnecks WILLIAM J. CHAMBLISS
Unlike the Saints, the Roughnecks were:

A) hardworking and content with fairly simple pleasures
B) visibly contemptuous of or hostile to authority and seen as guys headed for a bad end
C) thought of as typical boys, their deviant actions excused with the belief that "boys will be boys"
D) likely to engage in premarital sex and have several promiscuous sexual relationships

Question 51

The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON
Poor job prospects and joblessness for young black males, according to Wilson, are a consequence of:

A) substandard education in some of the nation's worst schools
B) declining union membership and the national job market shifting away from well-paid manufacturing jobs
C) employers' attitudes that cause them to pass over black male job applicants in favor of others
D) their lack of a network of friends and family who can refer them to unadvertised job openings and vouch for them to prospective employers
E) All of the above contribute to their joblessness and poor job prospects

Question 52

Uses of the Underclass in America HERBERT J. GANS
Gans argues that:

A) the label "undeserving," when attached to poor persons, provides an excuse for not trying to solve the problem of poverty itself
B) poverty has always been a "testing ground" for personal worth and the will to work hard in order to succeed
C) many cultural innovations (e.g. music, fashion, and literature) come from people who are considered poor in material terms but are rich in creativity
D) poverty causes the non-poor to think about social problems and take steps to help solve these problems through their churches, schools, and community organizations

Question 53

The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON
Among the factors that make it difficult for inner-city black males to find decent jobs are:

A) a lack of trust between job holders who might recommend someone for a job and the job seeker
B) the fatalistic attitude that hard work and effort cannot help a person succeed
C) the belief that they are discriminated against and no matter what they do, they will be treated unfairly
D) preference for engaging in the illegal sale of drugs over a job that earns them less money
E) All of the above contribute to their difficulties in finding decent jobs

Question 54

The Economic Plight of Inner-City Black Males (from More than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City) WILLIAM JULIUS WILSON
What two approaches does Wilson use in order to understand the problems of inner-city black males?

A) examination of cultural and social structural factors
B) post-industrial theory and feminist theory
C) organizational rationality and political economy
D) historical path-dependency (events could not have unfolded otherwise) and social psychology