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Mickayla Miller American Studies 1/22/12

__Summary:__  One of the biggest things that separating us is the difference between the rich and the poor, more commonly known as the top 1% in conflict with the other 99%. The 1% are the richest people in America, the billionaires. The ones with the big bucks. The 99% are the rest of the people, a lot of which are barely making ends meet on a monthly basis. As you could probably figure out, it isn’t the 1% that’s complaining, it’s the 99%. They think that the richest people of the nation are the greediest and most corrupt. That isn’t necessarily all that far off, the rich like to stay rich, and they think the poor should just remain in the class that they’re in. More money for them. Some protests are being done, such as the famous Occupy Wall St, and the Occupy movement has spread to a lot of other cities as well, including Oakland and San Francisco (Revkin). There may be debate for whether or not Occupy Wall St. is a controversial movement, but it’s clearly making its mark on America. __Relevance:__  There has always been a divide between people when it comes to money. Gold. Paper. Whatever you’d like to call it is fine. People have always noticed it, and have sometimes rebelled against it, but there wasn’t necessarily a study on it until after the Industrial Revolution. Karl Marx is the Sociologist that coined the term “Social Conflict Theory”. He said that as long as there was money differences with people, there would never be that equality that America needs to continue. If you have money, you have more of a chance in having better opportunities, and actually getting somewhere in life. He was also one of the first people to recognize the poverty cycle. Those in poverty usually tend to stay in poverty. He figured that since the poor didn’t really have money to throw around, that they wouldn’t have as many opportunities to succeed. To get somewhere in life, you need money. This is relevant to today because this scenario ties into a lot of people today. Raised in the ghetto, or a poor neighborhood perhaps, not having money to do anything. You can’t go to college without money. You can’t get a job these days without a college degree. Not having a job leads to lack of money, and then lack of money leads to living in a poor environment. Pretty reasonable cycle.  We also had problems in the late 1800’s because of poor money distribution, and unequal opportunity. It led to people in charge of the big businesses to be excessive money holders, and the workers to be left with virtually nothing. There were many protests back then due to the lack of money distribution. In the Homestead strikes that happened in 1892, the people rebelled against the steel companies. They got really mad when there weren’t many chances to grow economically.  In the 1930’s, there were a lot of protests due to the fact that there was the Great Depression. The Great Depression was caused by a couple reasons, one of the main ones being the stock market crash in 1929 that pretty much crippled our economy. They also felt that they could protest because there was a law passed in 1935 saying that the workers had the free right to get into groups and commence actual protest. They felt like the president was on their side. At that time, there was a 25% unemployment rate in the United States (Greenhouse). A lot of people turned to looting because there was pretty much no other options for someone who is broke and has no opportunities to get a job. Chicago was apart of the “rent riots” which was mainly in the black neighborhoods. Pretty much the rent was too high, and the housing people didn’t really take in any consideration because they still wanted to make the money. There were beatings, killings, and arrests made, and they demanded that the relief people would give them money (“1930”).

__Evaluation:__  The reason that Occupy Wall St. ties in so well to American Diversity, is because wealth is one of the main things that stratifies us Americans. Anyone can obviously see that there is a different quality of life and health that comes with the availability of money. Let’s say Karen’s family lives off of $14,000 a year, and Kenneth’s family lives off of $1,200,500 a year. Karen’s family has a higher chance of not having healthcare than Kenneth’s family. If Karen’s father were to get hurt on his job, he wouldn’t be covered for it, and the family would lose half of their income. If Kenneth’s father were to break a bone, he would probably get worker’s compensation, and have the problem fixed for virtually nothing. Karen has to go to a school in the city, where nothing is really all that safe, and the learning actually done there is minimal. Kenneth gets to go to a school where he can ask for a private tutor if need be, and he gets quality college prep schooling. Karen isn’t educated enough, and can’t go to college; no scholarships, and no other source of money, so she gets to live like her parents did. Kenneth had proper training, and can go to college without even having to worry about breaking the bank.  This scenario is extremely relevant. Things like this in America are happening every single day. Wealth is the biggest dividing factor among Americans.

Questions to consider: 1. What will come from Occupy Wall St.? 2. How can wealth massively affect someones future? 3. Are the 1% really as greedy as presented? <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">4. What does the Social Conflict Theory have to do with Occupy Wall St.? <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">5. Why would the government allow it to get that bad to the point where it’s like the late 1800’s all over again?

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Works Cited

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"1890s." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 27 Jan. 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1890s>.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">"1930-1939: The Unemployed Workers’ Movement." Libcom.org. Web. 27 Jan. 2012. <http://libcom.org/history/1930-1939-unemployed-workers-movement>.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Greenhouse, Steven. "Why American Workers Stay Off the Streets While Europeans Protest - NYTimes.com." The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. 04 Apr. 2009. Web. 27 Jan. 2012. <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/05/weekinreview/05greenhouse.html>.

<span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; font-family: Arial; font-size: 15px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Revkin, Andrew C. "Occupy Wall Street - The New York Times." Times Topics - The New York Times. 25 Jan. 2012. Web. 25 Jan. 2012. <http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/o/occupy_wall_street/index.html?scp=1-spot>.