1.What is the distinction that Reading 4.3 makes between owners and employees? Give an example of each.

One distinction between owners and employees is the way they make money and how they spend it. Owners have their employees work hard for them, while they sit back and make most of the profit. They live off the money they make off the backs of their employees. The employees, on the other hand, live paycheck to paycheck, not being able to pay most of their bills off. The rich make themselves richer by exploiting the poor.

2. How do you understand the quote by Adam Smith on pg. 28? What is it saying about labor?

Adam Smith explained how social class and capitalism work.  Let’s give the example of amazon, Jeff Bezos created Amazon with a 200,000 loan from his parents. After Amazon became successful, he now has working class working extreme hours with no benefits. This man had an advantaged with the help of his parents, to then exploit the working class to make himself richer. It’s not just Amazon but every big company in America.

3. What are your thoughts on the main argument of Reading 4.4 that class is NOT an identity?

Class is not an identity. I was born poor and am still poor in what is considered poor in the social class. That is not my identity, nor will it ever be. I have worked hard my whole life and have given myself the education I need. I am a gay Latina woman teacher, THAT is my identity. What we grow up with is not always going to be our future. If you work hard, and don’t make the same mistakes your parents did, I believe you can do better for yourself. Same goes for wealthy people, sometimes the richness that you grow up with can be taken away from you at any moment so to make class our whole identity is just a shame.

4. How do you understand the argument Reading 4.4. makes when stating that “class structures are built around a close form of dependency”? What is this close form of dependency, and can you think of an example?

The argument basically talks about how each class needs each other in a way. It’s a system that goes in circles. A worker is dependent on capitalism, they need the job to be able to even survive. While the wealthy owners rely on the exploitation of the workers to keep their companies alive.