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SociologyFactsheet

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Life ChancesLife chances – the level of opportunity an individual has to acquire material, social and cultural rewards such as possessions, statusand education.

Life chances, as a concept, has been defined by a variety of Sociologists since first being introduced by Weber in 1947.

According to Weber three differentaspects of life determine life chances:class (economic relationships); status(social standing) & party (power throughtrade unions, pressure groups and otherorganisations). Although he claimed thatall three were important, he recognisedthat they were linked to one another andthat class was the most influential of thethree.

More recent, simpler definitions havecome from other Sociologists such as CWright Mills (1959) who saw lifechances as all aspects of health,completion of higher education and theavoidance of being labelled as a criminal.Unlike Weber, Mills saw life chances asthe result solely of a person’s positionin the social class structure.

Dahrendorf (1979) introduced theconcepts of relative chances because aperson’s life chances are compared withothers in their society. He said that theywere a person’s relative chances ofobtaining those things desired withinsociety (such as financial security) andavoiding those considered undesirable(dying young).

The life chances approach suggests that status is not entirelyachieved, but is, to some extent, ascribed. This means that peopleare, effectively, given their status as a result of the group intowhich they are born, rather than earning it entirely on merit.

The life chances approach does not treat this as the only factordetermining adult status, but as an important contributoryinfluence.

An individual’s position in the stratification system will haveimportant implications for many other areas of their lives. It willaffect their access to those things defined by society as desirable,and their ability to avoid those things defined as undesirable.

According to Gerth and Mills (1953), this includes the opportunityto avoid infant mortality, to stay healthy, to receive a good, longterm education and to avoid becoming a criminal.

A person’s life chances are also influenced by other aspects ofstratification such as gender and ethnicity. However, the relationshipis complex because it is not always the case that one gender orethnic group benefits in comparison to others.

Those such as Peter Saunders (1990), from the New Right, whosupport the Capitalist system, point to the fact that the absolutelife chances of everybody have improved, no matter where theycome in the stratification system. However, their critics point tothe fact that the relative difference in life chances of those atdifferent levels in the system, has increased.

Exam Hint : Showing an understanding of theoretical debates willgain knowledge and understanding marks in the exam.

Evidence comes from government statistics. The middleclass enjoy higher standards of health, longereducation, live longer, are more likely to own their ownhomes and to own a variety of consumer goods. Theyare likely to have higher pensions and better workingconditions. The evidence that material inequalities inlife chances are not new comes from Westergaard andResler (1976) who found that between 1913 and 1960, the difference inincome between manual and non manual males increased by 9%.Routh’s (1980) figures show that the gap had narrowed somewhat by1978, but nevertheless unskilled manual workers earned 65% of theaverage wage compared with higher professionals’ 159%.

Exam Hint: Showing that you understand that inequalities are changingand continue to change, as you will see throughout this Factsheet,will gain further evaluation marks.

Recent government statistics back this up showing that the higheryour class, the more likely it is that:

• You will inherit significant amounts of money from yourfamily who will also know the right people

• Achieve higher level qualifications• Have higher status work and avoid unemployment.

Avoid poverty.• Have greater wealth and higher income.

Live in better quality housing.• Live longer.

Be ill less.Avoid a child dying

• Avoid a criminal record

Exam Hint : Knowing that there are different approaches to defining life chances will gain evaluation marks in the exam.

National Statistics Online 2005

Exam Hint : Make sure you let the examiner know that you realise lifechances affect all the above aspects of life.

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The middle classes transmit their advantages to their children, notonly through greater economic capital, but also through greatercultural capital.

Bourdieu (1977) introduced the term cultural capital to refer tothe extra cultural resources possessed by the middle classes.This includes higher education, having similar culturalexperiences to those who run society, and sharing their culture.

Not only do the middle class have an initial advantage with regardsto income, they also expect their income to continue to increasethrough most of their working lives, whereas manual workers mayhave to face pay cuts as they get older and less fit.

Employment and Life Chances

Male managers and senior officials earned an average of over£700 a week in 2000 compared with less than £400 for skilledtradesmen and £300 for elementary occupations for men. Theequivalent earnings for women were, over £500, under £300and under £250.

Middle class jobs usually involve greater security than workingclass jobs with longer periods of notice and better redundancyarrangements. They are also more likely to involve company cars,paid sick leave, health insurance and other ‘fringe benefits’.

The inferior market position of the working class is reflected in theirlower life chances. They are less likely to attain the desirable thingssuch as good health, long life and higher education; and are morelikely to suffer the undesirable such as criminal convictions andhaving to rent council run property.

The same sort of inequalities in life chances can be found with regardto ethnicity. However, it is not a simple equation that ethnic minoritystatus equals fewer life chances. According to theLabour Force Survey (2002/3), in some aspects of life,such as employment at the highest levels in business,minority ethnicity does equal fewer opportunities.However, it is generally not possible to generalisebecause in most areas of life there are great differencesbetween the opportunities of different ethnic groups.White British and Irish, Indian and Chinese people areleast likely to be unemployed and most likely to befound in professional occupations. Bangladeshis and Black peoplehave highest levels of unemployment and are least likely to be foundin professional occupations.

The Black pay gap

According to the Ethnic Minorities Task Force (2004), ethnicminorities earn, on average, 7% less than their Whitecounterparts: their average pay was £18 000 compared with £19500 for White employees. However, this statistic masks greatergaps with Bangladeshis earning an average of £12 000 and AfricanCaribbean and Pakistani men having an annual salary of £6 500less than Whites with the same qualifications. Indians andChinese employees earned similar incomes to their Whitecolleagues.

Between the ages of 18 and 60 there is a higher proportion of menthan women employed in every age group. However, while the UKmale working-age inactivity rate rose to 17% in 2005, the female ratefell to 27%, narrowing the gap in life chances.

In 2005, 23% of male employees usually worked over 48 hours aweek, with 11% of females usually working these longer hours.Longer working hours often means a higher income, relating to thesuperior income of males compared with females, but worse health,relating to the fact that men die at a younger age than women.

The gap between women’s median hourlypay and men’s was 13.0% in 2005. Themedian hourly rate for men went up 3.1%to £11.31, while the rate for womenincreased by 4.9% to £9.84. Thisdemonstrates that although the gender gap in pay has narrowed, itis still substantial, reflecting and reinforcing the difference in lifechances of males and females.

Exam Hint : Claims should always be supported by evidence/studiesand refuted, where applicable, by contradictory evidence/studies.

The Health Evidence

Lower working class infants are twice as likely todie during pregnancy or the first year of life asprofessional class infants. This is true throughoutthe stratification system with morbidity andmortality life chances directly related to social class position.

Death rates are falling throughout the stratification system, butprofessionals’ death rates fell by 34% more than unskilledworkers’ death rates, between 1972 and 1997, widening thesocial class health gap.

While most causes of death have declined, some morbidity suchas asthma and diabetes have increased during this period andthis growth is particularly true for the working class.

Pakistani and Bangladeshi men and women in England weretwice as likely to have poor health as indigenous White Britishmen and women according to government census statistics for2001. They were also more likely to suffer long term sickness ordisability. Chinese were reported to be the healthiest ethnicgroup.

In terms of gender and long term sickness or disability, women’srates were higher than men’s for Indians, Pakistanis, BlackCaribbeans and Black Africans. On the other hand, men’s ratesof long term sickness or disability were higher than women’s inWhite British and Irish groups.

However, in terms of general good health, rates were generallyslightly higher for men than for women in all age groups.

Health inequalities are compounded by the likelihood of smokingwhich is highest in the Bangladeshi, White Irish and BlackCaribbean men.

Source: National Statistics Online

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Health and life choices

Cultural explanations of health inequalities suggest that they stem from lifestyle choices. Warde (1997) showed thatthe working class spend more on unhealthy food and less on fresh fruit and vegetables than the middle class.

Similarly, the Family Spending Survey (1997) found that the middle class spent twice as much on leisure goods andequipment as the working class. However, it should be bourn in mind that they have about twice the income.

Roberts (2001) found that this continued into the 21st century in that the middle classes undertake more exercise than the workingclasses.

Similarly, the use of ghee and lack of exercise has been cited as a cause of Asian ill health.

Health and life chances

Structuralist explanations suggest that choices are constrained by an individual’s position in the stratification system.

Fresh fruit and vegetables are expensive, particularly in smaller shops. If an individual travels on public transport toavoid this expense, fruit and vegetables are heavy and not many can be carried back on the bus.

Leisure facilities are often located in white, middle class areas or near non manual work places. Gym membership is expensive andsubsidies are rarely available for lower grade staff, those from ethnic minorities or women.

Therefore the white, middle classes have far greater lifestyle choices available than the less advantaged groups.

The life chances view of the stratification system is based on a structuralist, Marxist approach and sees inequalities in education, health,wealth etc as a result of material deprivation.

This can be contrasted with the New Right position of theorists such as Saunders (1990) and Warde (1997) who see the disadvantagedsituation of some sections of society as a result of life choices.

Exam Hint : Showing you realise that health inequalities can be explained by material or cultural factors will gain A02 marks and help synopticity.

Another important area for life chances is housing. Poorer housing will affect health, available facilities, the likelihood of being a victim ofcrime, and many other aspects of life.

While life chances improved for everyone in many ways in the latter half of the 20th century, in terms of housing they have deteriorated forthose at the bottom of the stratification system, primarily as a result of government policies in the 1980s.

Life chances and Housing

In the 1980s, the government brought in the ‘Right to buy’ council houses, leading to an increase in homeownership of 16% between 1981 and 2000. (Council of Mortgage Lenders, 2002). However, this led to a 3 millionreduction in the number of council homes in the same period. (General Household Survey, 2001). The reducedavailability of social, including council, dwellings has meant that this is only available for those in greatestneed, leading to a concentration of deprivation on council estates.

According to Murie (1983) these changes in housing tenure have led to a polarisation in residential areasbetween the worst off and the rest. The areas where council houses remain are those which the residents did not want to, or could notafford to buy. They tend to be those in the poorest condition, the most overcrowded, in the most polluted areas with the fewestfacilities. This concentration of deprivation has increased differences in life chances.

Black families are the most likely to be headed by a lone parent. In 2001, 49% of households headed by a lone female lived in socialhousing and only 26% were buying their homes (census 2001).

Asian households were largest of all, and most likely to contain children. Asian households were also the most likely to contain morethan one family, potentially leading to overcrowding (census 2001).

Quality of housing affects women most, particularly Asian women, as they are likely to spend more time in the home.

Exam Hint : As much of the data for life chances comes fromgovernment statistics, you can talk about their reliability. If the questionspecifies that it will assess your understanding of methods, you mayneed to talk about the social construction of statistics.

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Another area life chances are both evident and important iseducation.

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Education and life chances

Gillborn & Youdell (2000) point to increasinginequality at secondary school level, resulting fromschools concentrating on those children most likelyto improve their league table position. They tend tobe white, middle class girls.

Similarly, Gewirtz et al (1995) found that the supposedincrease in choice in secondary education has led tothose parents with the greatest experience of theBritish education system being in a position to chooseand be selected for the ‘best’, most popular schools.

Despite the huge expansion in higher education over the past40 years, some social groups have benefited to a greater extentthan others. In 1998, 45% of people from higher social classesand 20% of people from lower social classes took up coursesleading to higher educational qualifications. Connor et al (2001)found that this was influenced by the life chances of differentsocial classes because of the differential knowledge of parentsand because working class parents are less likely to be able toprovide their children with financial support into their twenties.

Girls are far more likely than boys to achieve 5+ higher grades atGCSE and the gap continues to widen In 1992/3, 9.2% more girlsthan boys achieved this benchmark, whereas in 2001/2 this gaphad increased to 10.8%. (DES, 2003)

A similar pattern can be seen at A’ level with the likelihood ofachieving two or more A’ levels having increased for girls from20% in 1992/3 to 43% in 2001/2, whilst the equivalent figures forboys were 18% and 34%.

Some ethnic minority groups such as the Chinese and Indiansachieve better results at GCSE than White British students,whereas others such as Black Caribbean and African boys arefar less successful with less than 30% achieving 5 good GCSEscompared with over 60% of Indian boys and nearly 50% ofWhite British boys.

Girls achieve better results in all groups. Their ethnicity had thesame affect as it did for boys, with Indians achieving best resultsand Caribbean and African girls doing least well.

At higher education level, the Chinese were most likely to havea degree (31%) followed by the Indians and White Irish. 17% ofWhite British people had degrees. The least likely groups tohave degrees were Bangladeshis, and Black Caribbean men andPakistani women (10%).

National Statistics Online

Exam Hint : You will not be expected to know precise statistics. It isimportant to show you have some idea of differences between groups,and of trends.

Finally, an individual’s chances of becoming a criminal are seriouslyinfluenced by position in the stratification system.

Males of all ages are, on average, seven times more likely to befound guilty of an indictable crime than females although the gap issmaller among young teenagers.

Black African and Caribbean men are more likely than other groupsto be found guilty of indictable crimes. In addition, the workingclass are the most likely social class to be found guilty of indictablecrimes according to the England & Wales Criminal Statistics, 2001.

Criminal convictions and life chances

The chances of being convicted of a crime have been shown byBeinart et al (2002) to be closely linked with various other lifechance factors including

• Low income• Poor housing• Low achievement at school• Living in areas with a concentration of problem families

Racial harassment

In addition, those of Asian and mixed ethnic origin are most likely tobe victims of crime. Fear of crime is greatest among Asians, Blackand Chinese groups. It is also greatest among women and the elderly.

This means that all the undesirable aspects of society which can beavoided by those with good life chances act as a vicious or virtuouscircle.

Exam QuestionExamine the influence of ethnicity on an individual’s life chances intwo or more of the following areas: family; health; education; work& leisure; crime & deviance.

Exam Advice : You need to show sound knowledge of racismand discrimination, cultural and material deprivation andsocial exclusion. Inequalities in health, education, employment,welfare and police action may be used. Points should bediscussed in relation to the question, rather than just listed.Some depth on two of the areas is better than a superficialexamination of all of them. Make sure you clearly relateposition in the stratification system to the other substantiveareas in order to gain synoptic marks.

Similar questions could be asked where they refer to gender orsocial class instead of ethnicity.

Acknowledgements: This Sociology Factsheet was researched andwritten by Nicola Yeates.Curriculum Press. Bank House, 105 King Street, Wellington, TF11NU. Sociology Factsheets may be copied free of charge byteaching staff or students, provided that their school is a registeredsubscriber. No part of these Factsheets may be reproduced, storedin a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any other form or by anyother means, without the prior permission of the publisher. ISSN