SOC 201 Chapter 13: Chapter 13.2
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It"s touchy because asking questions about social class violates an important social myth: That people in the united states are pretty much equal. As one respondent to a survey explained to sociologist richard scase, class is not as important as it used to be, most people are middle class nowadays . Indeed, study after study has found that most everyone (well, anyway, at least 80 percent) in the united states will describe him- or herself as a member of the middle class. So, when you ask people about class and class differences, they will typically respond that such differences do not exist at least not where they come from. Being told that there are no social classes in the place where the interviewee lives is an old experience for sociologists. We don"t have classes in our town" almost invariably is the first remark recorded by the investigator, reports leonard reissman, author of class in.
