Income Inequality Versus American Dream: Comparative Essay

Many may say that income inequality has been around for as long as the American Dream has. The American Dream appears to be this theory of one earning a great job making up to six figures or more, being able to support their family with expensive gifts, driving new fancy cars as well as sending your children off to college, and starting a retirement savings account plan all at an early age. Income inequality is known as the “lack of equal distribution of money known as the gap between rich and poor.” Income inequality plays into a lot of different roles. Income inequality comes in effect in versions. Income inequality tends to mess with your health because, while stuck in poverty you have limited resources. Poverty opens others problems in society as well. Lately, the United States has been exposed to the largest rise in income inequality since humankind while the, “The rich getting richer and poor getting poorer” which arise this huge issue in America. Not even individually as a poor person but, as the economy, as a whole it can affect us. One of the main social issues concerning power, status and class in today’s society has been income inequality. Till today plenty of countries show graphical representation of unequal distributions of wealth in income by making use of the Lorenz Curve, have extremely low education graduation rates and people are not often able to receive the proper health care they deserve, and lastly this income gap between the rich and the poor has become extremely insert. This gap between the wealthy and poor has grown to be an enormous amount over the past few decades.

Income inequality is very harmful towards one’s health. We as people go through hard times and these hard times challenges society’s activity. Inequality makes one angry, especially in communities where the population is high and the income is low. The rich will continue to run while the poor stays stagnant. Health begins to be a big issue because the poor are not able to afford the help that they need. Therefore, things such as health care are not able to be given out. Lanahan says “there is a growing body of research into the so called social determinants of health”. This is the research that is trying to make the poor able to get things to improve health, such things that the rich may already have. In fact the World Health Organizationis using this research as a direct help, to help the less fortunate because income inequality has become more popular populations numbers decrease year by year. “Health and social problems increase as income inequality does” said, Richard Wilkinson. It has also been proven that when income inequality in higher neighborhoods began to find that there is little to no trust, the numbers are low, communities will start to look better and you see trust within the neighbors. Once there is a heavy flow of income, the people will start to feel happier and the community will begin to feel uplifted. As Americans we all very much so blame each individual for their own health but, when in fact income inequality is the root cause to the situation of the obesity. According to dictioninay.com obesity is defined as “the condition of being very fat or overweight; corpulence:”. Obesity comes with serious precautions to your mental and physical health, it seems to be one of the most popular illnesses with the most ongoing patterns and bashing use of language. Yet, the most famous one being “How can poor people be so fat”. People overlook the concept of being obease, or maybe just overlook how much more the rich can do in life. Just by how much an individual make monthly affects our health, the richer you are the least likely you’ll be obease. The rich have better access to things that the poor don’t such as: proper health care, healthy foods, and plastic surgeons. While not even half the population of the poor can afford health care, or always eating restaurant food because they can’t afford the organics, they are constantly working to keep up with bills so they have no time to exercise, and the majority of them have children young which causes stress, and stress causes people to overeat, the lack of education with no social support and so on and so forth. These are all reasons proving how income inequality causes obesity. As a community we should address where health is at a loss. When it is not addressed as a whole economy we fall. So, obviously, we should be attentive when issues such as this is at hand.

Health outcomes from inequality have been proven to not be good. According to Inequality.org “the poor deal with many things that are critical to their health such as life expectancy, mortality, and obesity.” It all makes sense when you put it into account, when we as an economy are not equal the poor will suffer. Income inequality is going on throughout the entire world. Places with known low income have a higher rate of health disorders. This makes all the sense because the poor is overlooked therefore they go through trials that attack health. Life expectancy, mortality, and obesity are all three very important things that cause death, each happens because of the unequal distribution of money. Income inequality attacks your health because it is things that you cannot get when deep in poverty. And poverty opens other problems in society as well. When those effects start getting brought up it exposes the fact that income inequality is worse than people think. Though there are ways to help fix this issue.

As we know income inequality causes a huge risk of health gaps and there are numerous ways on improving so. According to Divine “An affordable good education is a step in the right direction. Education is a critical piece that the poor could use to complete in the middle class or higher” the access to education strictly depends on if your financially stable enough to cover the entire cost. And this had been proven from elementary all the way to undergraduate and graduate in college. The wealthy families are able to send their children to these much fancier private, boarding, and cathlioc schools. They are able to provide their child with a tutor in whatever subject needed. When school is unaffordable there is no way for children with a lower house income to compete. By lowering the cost of childhood education, this allows the least wealthy children to have a chance for an education as well. The lower income households should be more concerned with this education inequality because they are the ones who will mostly suffer from not being able to get a degree which come with a well paying job. Getting an education will enhance your health automatically because you are learning how to carry and take care of yourself. Poor children with no education are blind to a lot, especially facts that can improve their health. By not being properly educated adolescents are not able to find out such tips. Not having a pro[er education and low income can also be another reason to why America’s crime rate is so high. Many people don’t have anything to do all day, they are angry but don’t know exactly what for. Another way to move towards the helping of income inequality is by stopping discrimination and investing in women. By investing in our women we can expand families. If all women was to have a steady income, one that they deserve the world would be a happier place. Women in the workplace are treated unfairly. Believe it or not the gender pay gap is very effective. In 2015, women working full-time year around According to “The Simple Truth About the Gender Pay Gap” earned only 80 percent for every dollar that men earned (Hegewisch and DuMonthier 2016). If all women around the globe was to see a raise in equal income nearly 25 million children will benefit from the income gap. This would lead to tons of people lifted out of proverly and a start to the equal distribution of wealth. Pay gaps fluctuate depending on which state your in. By encouraging both business women and men and teaching one how to become more active in getting money. Once all comes into play and everyone has their mind fixated on the greater things, there is no reason for one not to have an income. There are many other ways to fix income inequality but these ways are most critical to fixing this horrible gap that is continuous till today.

According to Ken Thompson it is “two primary ways income inequality has been addressed being government regulation in the form of a wage and through unions .” this shows that wages are low because of the falling of unions. That needs to get fixed in order to help income inequality. Pittsburgh got very active in helping find the fix for the problem of health activeness. They got help from hospitals and other foundations to ensure they get the biggest help they can to achieve the goal that needs direct attention. Showing that it is places that are taking measures to help this problem . Places of immediate help are teaming up to help income inequality. Not only does income inequality cause serious effects on our fiscal state of mind, it also puts heavy weight on our mental prosperity. This is why It is extremely important that the United States government acquired serious actions in order to help end this unequal distributions of wealth. History Income inequality in the United States has increased and decreased throughout history, but in recent years, the widening gap has become a serious issue. Studies have shown workers who held positions where they lacked job control, and high demanding low reward positions were more likely to gain weight, and live in an unhealthy body weight, including unhealthy body mass index, and waist circumference. The researchers concluded that the effects of the adult workers have a tremendous impact on the children in the household and that addressing income gap could show an increase in the health of the low-income workers.

While I was conducting my very own personal data on income inequality I stood out in Malcolm X hallways and politely asked everyone who walked passed and was interested a couple questions. I conducted the same experiment outside of The University Of Illinois at Chicago (UIC). All my questions where “yes” or “no” based questioned and which didn’t require any personal information. My survey was based off how students who attended a community college versus the student who attends a university view the difference in income inequality. The purpose of my experiment was to get different thoughts on how people view income inequality. There was a total of 15 questions and the last few questions mainly focused on the individual itself. I narrowed it down and strictly asked each person if they felt like their household suffers from income inequality. I had a total of 306 surveys and when i went back to review the look of things i was pretty astonished. I tried to equally distribute 150 surveys to Malcolm and the other 150 to UIC. For Malcolm x to be a community college many people said they do not feel as if their household is suffering from poverty. I did in fact take into account that Community colleges do hold a great scholarship called “STARS” where they grant you up to three years free tuition and I considered that as a question on my survey but many people still seemed to feel as if their not in poverty at both Malcolm X and UIC. So I changed memos and conducted the same experiment but instead I received permission and visited a couple different High Schools, one being my former highschool Albert G Lane Tech,Walter Payton, Whitney M. Young, Orr Academy, Prosser Career Academy, and North Lawndale. Now, here’s where my data starts to change. I grouped school Lane Tech, Whitney Young and Walter Payton together because these are all selective and enrollment schools whereas, Orr Academy , Prosser and North Lawndale are all neighborhood high schools. When i received and reviewed my surveys from the selective enrollment schools once again the majority of these students did not feel as if they were in poverty most of the students that attend schools like that usually travel thirty to maybe even an hour to get to school coming from wealthy neighborhoods. However, once I received my surveys from the neighborhood schools the responses totally changed. Literally almost everyone who completed the survey said they are suffering from income inequality. Now, I asked no personal questions but they were allowed a comments box where they felt free to express how they felt on the situation, this one paper I received back completely tour my heart. There was no name left behind but they explained their person situation at home to where she/he is a single parent who leaves their child behind with their sickly grandmother just so they can graduate highschool. I chose to do this type of collective data because I felt as if it was the easiest way to get through to people without personally asking them personal questions which they might have felt uncomfortable answering from a stranger. I didn’t find what I was looking for when I tried comparing the two colleges which makes since because college students come from everywhere regardless of the location of the school and also if your smart enough college can be free to a certain extent. But once I out my surveys out in high school I started to see the difference. Students who felt as if their household is not suffering from poverty turned out to be the students coming from a two parent household, and who are going to attend college which where mainly the ones who attended the selective enrollment schools. While on the other hand, the students who attended the neighborhood schools most likely were stuck in poverty in desperate need of help, they were least likely to attend college and most likely to work a minimum wage job. My survey here is clear representation on how income inequality is very much so seguarted even within the education system in America.

Income inequality was a large reason why people immigrated here in the 1800’s. Their countries were becoming too segregated by classification of income. Now this country is becoming more of what those people fled from over a hundred years ago.

Income inequality not only harms us fiscally, but also affects our mental and physical wellbeing; therefore, it is important to identify the right ways to control wealth distribution among people. History Income inequality in the United States has increased and decreased throughout history, but in recent years, the widening gap has become a serious issue……..

And till today The exact reasons for the drastic growth in income inequality are still not well understood. However, there are some factors that are identified that might have contributed to this drastic rise in the inequality of earnings in the US. These factors supposedly affect the rise directly or indirectly. These factors are the decrease in a number of labor unions functioning in the US; the increase in globalization; the rapid changes in technology that is biased towards skills, and increased number of unskilled or semi-skilled immigrants. These causes and effects of risings income inequality are discussed below. The number labor unions have reduced because the America ‘s workforce has primarily changed from manufacturing jobs that require low skills, which are primarily consistent and easy to organize, to jobs that require highly skilled labor, which require a college education and is mostly individualized. It is the low skilled laborers that are usually members of labor unions. However, their numbers are declining that causes a decline in the number of labor unions. Poor people are obese because they have no money to buy healthy food, they have no time to exercise, they have stress that causes them to eat constantly, they lack education, they do not have access to the healthcare, they do not have social support and so on. It is mostly about the income inequality.