Socio-Economic Scale---street ho's>>>>>>?

Great Debates
1

I have been studying crack cocaine addicted prostitutes for the past six years (ethnographer). Is this subculture the lowest group on the socio-economic scale in the United States? My thinking is that it is, but I am willing to be corrected.

If given the opportunity, I would like to study the opposite end of the socio-economic spectrum. There seems to be some debate over this particular subculture, is it elite scientists, or the offspring lineage with old money (at least five generations), or is it some other subculture?

2

How about the herion addicted prostitutes?

3

I am in no way an ethnographer, nor have I ever come in to contact with drug-addicted prostitutes.

Nevertheless, my nomination for another option would be the mentally ill homeless.

4

I don’t think that, statistically speaking, using people who are considered to be mentally ill is the way to go about comparing and constrasting what are (probably by hypothesis) supposed to be the same people in different stations in life.

I think that it dosn’t really matter if it is crack or not, though you do have the brain damage issue to deal with when comparing your groups. Does crack cause brain damage or is it just addictive?

I think as a comparitively opposite group the best wouldn’t be scientists per se, but persons whose income is greater than, say a few million or so a year but who didn’t come into money by birth. People who work themselevs rich versus people who work but never get anywhere. An interesting comparison, IMO.

5

Originally posted by erislover

  1. I think that it dosn’t really matter if it is crack or not, though you do have the brain damage issue to deal with when comparing your groups. Does crack cause brain damage or is it just addictive?

  2. I think as a comparitively opposite group the best wouldn’t be scientists per se, but persons whose income is greater than, say a few million or so a year but who didn’t come into money by birth. People who work themselevs rich versus people who work but never get anywhere. An interesting comparison, IMO.

  1. Good point about the brain damage. It may be difficult to determine when the brain damage starts. Let’s say that there has been no brain damage.

  2. I think Paul Fussell (book–“Class”), and other experts would disagree with you concerning the “new rich”. I read somewhere that Clinton surrounded himself with intellectuals, and Bush has surrounded himself with old money people. Personally, I have more admiration for elite scientists than I do for the new rich.

6

I didn’t think we were discussing admiration but trying to find groups that were economically/socially dissimilar enough to be called opposite.

Crack whores: working poor. New rich: working rich. Neither are riding on someone else’s shirttails, so to speak.

I have more admiration for the abstract crack whore. I think I would kill myself rather than live like that. They’ve got more proven determination than I do. :wink:

7

I’ve been browsing around on Google for a while, under “socioeconomic lowest American”, and it looks as though to get really rock-bottom “lowest”, you’re going to have to stipulate the following factors:

–black,
–crack-addicted,
–non-English speaking,
–illiterate,
–illegal alien,
–female,
–prostitutes,
–who have either HIV or AIDS,
–and who live in inner-city urban areas.

So, what’s the opposite of all that?

–white,
–non-crack-addicted,
–English speaking,
–literate,
–legal resident,
–male,
–non-prostitutes,
–who don’t have either HIV or AIDS,
–and who don’t live in inner-city urban areas.

This could be most of the guys I know, including my dad, my brothers, and the Better Half. I don’t think merely looking for “the opposite of a crack whore” is going to get you anywhere. You’ll have to define your terms a little bit better, or something.

8

I think the opposite of the lowest of the low is old money, but bear in mind that that can include people who don’t really have money anymore but act as if they do. You should try to get your hands on a copy of the documentary People Like Us–it aired on PBS back in September and looked at people across the social class spectrum. There are some interesting essays at http://www.pbs.org also.

As for Clinton’s circle, I refuse to consider Barbra Streisand an intellectual!

9

Kiplinger’s recently did a survey of the best and worst jobs in America, and for the fourth year in a row, systems analyst takes the top spot.

As for the worst job in America, last year’s winner, crackwhore, was edged out by assistant crackwhore.

[/weekend update]

10

I don’t believe it would be possible to label either the lowest or highest socio-economic group with a simple definition like ‘crack whore’ or ‘uber-scientist’. DDG’s methodology make infinitely more sense. An individual will need to fit a whole slew of criteria for you to even approach accurately binning them into meaningful groups.