The Real World
AN INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY
2nd Edition
Kerry Ferris and Jill Stein
Chapter 12
The Economy, Work, and
Working
Why study economy or work?
• An economy deals not only with money but
also with the production, distribution, and
consumption of goods and services within a
society.
• This is a major link between individuals
(micro) and society (macro).
Historical and Economic Changes
• In the U.S., the economy has changed over
time. New technologies have also changed
the nature of our work.
Historical and Economic Changes
(cont’d)
• Earliest American economy: Pre-sixteenthcentury Native American societies were
either mobile hunting and gathering
societies or horticultural societies (which
were based on the domestication of animals,
farming, and generating a surplus of
resources).
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Historical and Economic Changes
(cont’d)
• The Agricultural Revolution included social
and economic changes, population
increases, and increased efficiency of food
production.
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Historical and Economic Changes
(cont’d)
• The Industrial Revolution rapidly
transformed social life resulting from the
technological and economic developments
including the assembly line, steam power,
and urbanization. With this shift to a
manufacturing economy, vast numbers of
people migrated into cities in search of work.
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Historical and Economic Changes
(cont’d)
• The Information Revolution refers to the
recent social revolution made possible by the
development of the microchip in the 1970s,
which brought about vast improvements in
the ability to manage information.
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Economic Systems: Comparing
Capitalism and Socialism
• Capitalism is an economic system based on
the laws of free market competition,
privatization of the means of production, and
production for a profit, with an emphasis on
supply and demand as a means to set price.
• Encourages efficiency:
• New technology
• Expansion of markets
• Cost cutting
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Economic Systems: Comparing
Capitalism and Socialism (cont’d)
• Socialism is an economic system based on
the collective ownership of the means of
production, collective distribution of goods
and services, and government regulation of
the economy.
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Economic Systems: Comparing
Capitalism and Socialism (cont’d)
• Communism is a system of government that
eliminates private property and is the most
extreme form of socialism because all
citizens work for the government and there
are no class distinctions.
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Economic Systems: Comparing
Capitalism and Socialism (cont’d)
• All nations’ economies have both capitalist
and socialist aspects. For example, the
capitalist United States has some socialist
economic features, including business
subsidies, market regulations, and public aid
programs.
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The Nature of Industrial and PostIndustrial Work
• Before the Industrial Revolution, economic
production took place in the household—but
the birth of the factory led to the “workplace”
and raised new work-related issues.
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The Nature of Industrial and PostIndustrial Work (cont’d)
• Karl Marx argued that when people lose
control over their production and the
conditions of production, they become
alienated and view work as a means to
survive rather than a rewarding activity.
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Karl Marx: Alienation
• Marx believed workers were alienated in
four ways:
•
•
•
•
from the product of their labor
from their own productive activity
from their fellow workers
from human nature
The Nature of Industrial and PostIndustrial Work (cont’d)
• In a post-industrial economy, many workers
do service work, which often involves direct
contact with clients, customers, patients, or
students by the workers.
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The Nature of Industrial and PostIndustrial Work (cont’d)
• Other workers in the post-industrial economy
are involved in knowledge work, which
includes jobs that involve working with
information.
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Resistance Strategies: How
Workers Cope
• Individuals and groups cope with their
working conditions in a variety of ways called
resistance strategies (ways that workers
express discontent with their working
conditions and try to reclaim control of the
conditions of their labor).
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Individual Resistance Strategies:
How Workers Cope
• Individual resistance can include using work
time to surf the web, sabotaging an assembly
line, and personalizing a workspace with
photos.
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Collective Resistance Strategies:
How Workers Cope
• Collective resistance can include
membership in a union (an association of
workers who bargain collectively for
increased wages and benefits and better
working conditions).
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Globalization, Economics, and
Work
• Globalization refers to the cultural and
economic changes resulting from
dramatically increased international trade
and exchange in the late twentieth and early
twenty-first centuries.
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Top Forty Economies Ranked by GDP and Total Sales, 2007 (Table 12.1,top)
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Top Forty Economies Ranked by GDP and Total Sales, 2007 (Table 12.1,bottom)
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Globalization, Economics, and
Work (cont’d)
• Transnational corporations are another part
of the global economy that transcend
national borders so that their products can be
manufactured, distributed, marketed, and
sold from bases all over the world.
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Globalization, Economics, and
Work (cont’d)
• Companies’ search for the cheapest way to
produce goods often involves outsourcing
(“contracting out” or transferring to another
country the labor that a company might
otherwise have employed its own staff to
perform) or the use of a sweatshop (a
workplace where workers are subject to
below-standard wages, long hours, and poor
working conditions).
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Alternative Ways of Working
• The modern economy is characterized by
more diverse and specialized jobs, and more
temps and freelancers.
• In a capitalist society, we increasingly rely on
the independent or third sector, made up of
nonprofit organizations that take care of
necessary but unprofitable social needs.
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Volunteers by Type of Organization for Which Volunteer Activities
Were Performed and Selected Characteristics, 2007 (Table 12.2,left)
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Volunteers by Type of Organization for Which Volunteer Activities
Were Performed and Selected Characteristics, 2007 (Table 12.2,right)
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Economy | Concept Quiz
1. The rapid transformation of social life resulting from
the technological and economic developments that
began with the assembly line, steam power, and
urbanization was called the:
a. Agricultural Revolution
b. Industrial Revolution
c. Information Revolution
d. American Revolution
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Economy | Concept Quiz
2. Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of
capitalism?
a. It is based on the laws of free market
competition.
b. It is based on production for a profit.
c. It is based on privatization of the means of
production.
d. It is based on government regulation of the
economy.
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Economy | Concept Quiz
3. Which “era” began in the 1970s with the
development of the microchip or microprocessor
used in computers and other electronic devices?
a. Agricultural Revolution
b. Industrial Revolution
c. Information Revolution
d. American Revolution
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Economy | Concept Quiz
4. The ways that workers express discontent with their
working conditions and try to reclaim control of the
conditions of their labor are called:
a. bureaucratic constraints
b. unions
c. disembodied efforts
d. resistance strategies
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Economy | Concept Quiz
5. Annie volunteers at a local “fair trade” store that is
a non-profit organization that supports human
rights. What part of the economy does Annie
support?
a. The local sector
b. The independent or third sector
c. The second sector
d. The small profit margin sector
e. The non-conglomerate sector
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Additional Art for Chapter 12
Chapter Opener
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Kerry Ferris’s Occupational Family Tree
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Slaves at Work in the Field
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Women Working in a Shoe Factory
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Knowledge Workers
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Working in Prime Time
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Social Support in the United States
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Twenty-First-Century Industrial Work
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Nickel and Dimed
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
The Postindustrial Office?
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Fast Food, Fast Talk
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1912
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Victory for All Workers?
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Jimmy Dunne
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Are Sweatshops Good or Bad?
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Chinese Gold Farmers
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
“Always Low Prices,” at What Cost?
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
Theory in Everyday Life
The Real World: An Introduction to Sociology, 2nd Edition
Copyright © 2010 W.W. Norton & Company
This concludes the Lecture
PowerPoint presentation for
Chapter 12
The Real World
AN INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY
2nd Edition
Kerry Ferris
and
Jill Stein
For more learning resources, please
visit the StudySpace site for
The Real World, 2e at:
wwnorton.com/studyspace
© 2010 W. W. Norton Co., Inc.
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