Video and Multimedia

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Video Links

  • Wealth Inequality in America
    This short video explains the differences in income and wealth between the top 1% of the wealthiest individuals in the United States and the poorest individuals in the United States. The information is presented in an easy to understand graph.

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  • Close to Home
    During the early years of the current recession, documentary filmmaker Ofra Bikel brought her cameras and recording equipment to Deborah Hair Design, a salon on the Upper East Side that caters to a relatively affluent population. In this Frontline special, she shows how the recession has affected Deborah, the salon owner, as well as the clientele—who are now going longer between appointments and foregoing their regular services in an effort to stretch their budgets. 

    

  • Bill Moyers—Exposé on the Business of Poverty
    Poverty has become big business in the United States as a number of corporations have found ways to fill the “need” many poor people have for credit/financing. This investigative report describes predatory lending practices that specifically target poor people.

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  • West Virginia, Still Home
    This short video from the New York Times profiles economically depressed McDowell County, West Virginia. The area offers few economic opportunities, so its young people are moving away. It depicts an unfortunate cycle that is difficult to halt, much less reverse. 

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Audio Links

  • The Art of Living at the Poverty Line
    This podcast from NPR takes a look at Edith Calzado, a single mother who makes $16,000 a year and yet still manages to make ends meet, go on vacation, and pay her credit cards on time. She gets food stamps and lives in subsidized housing.

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  • This American Life 331: Habeas Schmabeas 2007
    The right of habeas corpus has been a part of our country's legal tradition longer than we've actually been a country. It means that our government has to explain why it's holding a person in custody. But now, the War on Terror has nixed many of the rules we used to think of as fundamental. At Guantanamo Bay, our government initially claimed that prisoners should not be covered by habeas—or even by the Geneva Conventions—because they're the most fearsome enemies we have. But is that true? Is it a camp full of terrorists, or a camp full of our mistakes? In Act One, Jack Hitt explains how President Bush's War on Terror changed the rules for prisoners of war, and how it is that under those rules, it would be possible that someone whose classified file declares that they pose no threat to the United States could still be locked up indefinitely—potentially forever!—at Guantanamo. Act Two explains that habeas corpus began in England. And recently, 175 members of the British Parliament filed a "friend of the court" brief in one of the U.S. Supreme Court cases on habeas and Guantanamo—apparently, the first time in Supreme Court history that's happened. In their brief, the members of Parliament warn about the danger of suspending habeas: "During the British Civil War, the British created their own version of Guantanamo Bay and dispatched undesirable prisoners to garrisons off the mainland, beyond the reach of habeas corpus relief." In London, reporter Jon Ronson, goes in search of what happened. Act Three explains that though more than 200 prisoners from the U.S. facility at Guantanamo Bay have been released, few of them have ever been interviewed on radio or on television in America. Jack Hitt conducts rare and surprising interviews with two former Guantanamo detainees about life in Guantanamo.

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  • This American Life 62: Something for Nothing
    Theoretically, all members of a class system, no matter how destitute they are, can rise to the top. In practice, however, mobility between classes may be difficult for some people. The stories presented in this episode are of people trying to get rich quick or otherwise make something for nothing. As everyone knows, there's no such thing as something for nothing. You always pay a price.

     

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Web Resources

Professional Resources

  • Marxist Sociologists
    Marxist Sociologists, of course, are greatly concerned with these issues.
     
  • Journal of Poverty
    Research on economic inequality regularly appears in all general sociology journals. A journal devoted entirely to the issue of poverty is the Journal of Poverty.

Data Resources

  • The United States Census Bureau Poverty Statistics
    Each year, the Census Bureau compiles statistics regarding the number of individuals in the United States who are living below the poverty line. The data are compiled from household surveys and programs. This website gives information pertaining to the poverty line and gives a report on the number of people living in poverty.
     
  • The National Longitudinal Surveys
    The National Longitudinal Surveys of the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics gather detailed information about labor market experiences and other aspects of the lives of American men and women. 
     
  • The Department of Health and Human Services
    The Department of Health and Human Services has a web page devoted to explaining the federal poverty guidelines used to determine financial eligibility for certain federal programs.
     
  • The Panel Study of Income Dynamics
    The Panel Study of Income Dynamics is a longitudinal survey of a representative sample of U.S. men, women, and children and the families in which they reside. Data on employment, income, wealth, health, housing, food expenditures, transfer income, and marital and fertility behavior have been collected annually since 1968.

​Other Resources

  • Michael Kearl's Sociological Tour Through Cyberspace
    Michael Kearl’s Sociological Tour Through Cyberspace: Social Inequality. This contains more information and links on social inequality than you will be able to handle. Something for everyone. Happy surfing!
     
  • The Poverty Fight
    This article from Contexts, published by the American Sociological Association, focuses on the fight against poverty. The author of this article makes the point that lowering the number of those who live in poverty will involve political actions and when people—in poor communities, in advocacy groups, in government, in the academy, and elsewhere—mobilize to advance antipoverty agendas. 
     
  • The Stress of Systemic Poverty is Killing Us
    This article from Pacific Standard magazine takes a look at how racial minorities who are living in poverty suffer from many health-related conditions mainly due to receiving less attention from their physicians. 
     
  • Inequality.org
    Does income and wealth inequality matter? Why is it happening? What can be done? Despite the emerging consensus over the fact of rising inequality, there is still wide divergence of opinion over its sources—and potential solutions. Inequality.org was created to serve as a dependable portal of information. Too much inequality, we believe, undermines democracy, community, culture, and economic health. Because the problem is so important, accuracy is important, and we are committed to presenting the best and latest information (self-characterization).
     
  • The Economic Policy Institute (EPI)
    The EPI, a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank, was created in 1986 to broaden discussions about economic policy to include the needs of low- and middle-income workers. EPI believes every working person deserves a good job with fair pay, affordable health care, and retirement security. To achieve this goal, EPI conducts research and analysis on the economic status of working America. EPI proposes public policies that protect and improve the economic conditions of low- and middle-income workers and assesses policies with respect to how they affect those workers.