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Population health tends to be better in societies where income is more equally distributed. Recent evidence suggests that many other social problems, including mental illness, violence, imprisonment, lack of trust, teenage births, obesity, drug abuse, and poor educational performance of schoolchildren, are also more common in more unequal societies. Differences in the prevalence of ill health and social problems between more and less equal societies seem to be large and to extend to the vast majority of the population. Rather than referencing all the literature, this paper attempts to show which interpretations of these relationships are consistent with the research evidence. After discussing their more important and illuminating characteristics, we conclude that these relationships are likely to reflect a sensitivity of health and social problems to the scale of social stratification and status competition, underpinned by societal differences in material inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The high-tech industry is the world's most powerful and profitable industry, and it is almost entirely dominated by white, Asian American, and Asian men. This article reviews research on social inequality in the high-tech industry, focusing on gender and race/ethnicity. It begins with a discussion of alternative ways of defining the sector and an overview of its history and employment demographics. Next is an analysis of gendered and racialized pathways into high-paying jobs in the industry, followed by a review of research on workplace organization that emphasizes how sexism and racism are embedded inside the firm and beyond it, through the design of high-tech products and services. Finally, gender and racial disparities in attrition rates are discussed. The conclusion calls for future research on social inequality and the funding structure of the industry, age discrimination inside tech, effective diversity policies, and labor movement activism throughout the high-tech industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The construct of age occupies a curious position in mainstream sociology: It is omnipresent but theoretically underdeveloped. The most prevalent approaches—age as control variable and age as life course—elide the aspect of age most relevant to the discipline, namely its operation as a system of inequality. Building on the foundation laid by scholars of life course sociology, age studies, and gerontology, I propose a new framework for thinking about age. The framework integrates insights from these fields and identifies inequality as a key axis on which several dimensions of age turn, thus placing age squarely in the domain of sociological research centering on inequalities. The article concludes with a discussion of how this framework can enhance the empirical and theoretical contributions of age-focused research. In particular, research that delves into how institutions, performances, and identities reproduce age inequality flows from this framework and constitutes a valuable contribution in its own right. Moreover, such an orientation positions the sociology of age as integral to the discipline, given its commitment to understanding how inequalities infuse social life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite decades of progress, the future of life expectancy in the United States is uncertain due to widening socioeconomic disparities in mortality, continued disparities in mortality across racial/ethnic groups, and an increase in extrinsic causes of death. These trends prompt us to scrutinize life expectancy in a high-income but enormously unequal society like the United States, where social factors determine who is most able to maximize their biological lifespan. After reviewing evidence for biodemographic perspectives on life expectancy, the uneven diffusion of health-enhancing innovations throughout the population, and the changing nature of threats to population health, we argue that sociology is optimally positioned to lead discourse on the future of life expectancy. Given recent trends, sociologists should emphasize the importance of the social determinants of life expectancy, redirecting research focus away from extending extreme longevity and toward research on social inequality with the goal of improving population health for all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The extent and causes of trends and cross-national variation in social class and occupational status mobility have been major topics of sociological research for decades. This topic has acquired renewed salience as inequality in many industrialized countries has increased and as improvements in data and estimation methods have stimulated increased scrutiny of intergenerational earnings or income mobility as well. The more recent focus on earnings or income mobility largely comes from economists, though sociologists and interdisciplinary teams have made increasingly important contributions. Compelling evidence supports the hypothesis that inequality trends are generating trends in absolute earnings mobility. Evidence about the impact of inequality on relative mobility is less clear, partly because within-country relative mobility trends are weak, partly because between-country differences in relative mobility likely have multiple causes, and partly because the rough stability in relative mobility could arise from offsetting forces. Efforts to exploit local variation in inequality and mobility have added important insights, as have studies that focus attention on mechanisms. The question of how inequality affects mobility cannot be answered definitively without a solid understanding of the multiple pathways that link a country's economic and institutional structure to its pattern of social mobility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Norms are a foundational concept in sociology. Following a period of skepticism about norms as overly deterministic and as paying too little attention to social conflict, inequalities, and agency, the past 20 years have seen a proliferation of norms research across the social sciences. Here we focus on the burgeoning research in sociology to answer questions about where norms come from, why people enforce them, and how they are applied. To do so, we rely on three key theoretical approaches in the literature—consequentialist, relational, and agentic. As we apply these approaches, we explore their implications for what are arguably the two most fundamental issues in sociology—social order and inequality. We conclude by synthesizing and building on existing norms research to produce an integrated theoretical framework that can shed light on aspects of norms that are currently not well understood—in particular, their change and erosion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay, we develop a framework for understanding the evolving relationships between technology, work, and family. We focus primarily on the temporal, spatial, and relational boundaries between work and family and the ways in which technology is changing boundary management practices. We suggest that the ubiquity and power of communications technologies require active technology management and, specifically, the development of a form of cultural capital that we call digital cultural capital. We are concerned that the technological changes currently underway may deepen and reinforce social and economic inequalities in new and unanticipated ways. We endeavor to synthesize and connect the disparate bodies of research on these nascent issues and lay out an agenda for future lines of inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What are, and what should be, the boundaries between self and society, individuals and groups? To address these questions, we synthesize research on privacy that is relevant for two foundational sociological issues: social order and inequality. By synthesizing work on a narrow yet fundamental set of issues, we aim to improve our understanding of privacy as well as provide a foundation for understanding contemporary privacy issues associated with information and communication technology. We explore the role of privacy in maintaining social order by examining the connections of privacy with social control and with group cohesion. We also discuss how inequality produces variation in privacy and how this variation in turn contributes to inequality. Throughout the review we identify potential directions for sociological research on privacy generally and in the context of new technologies. Our discussion highlights implications of privacy that extend beyond individual-level concerns to broader social, structural impacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine a vast, interdisciplinary, and increasingly global literature concerning skin color and colorism, which are related to status throughout the world. The vast majority of research has investigated Western societies, where color and colorism have been closely related to race and racism. In Latin America, the two sets of concepts have particularly overlapped. In the rest of the world, particularly in Asia, color and colorism have also been important but have evolved separately from the relatively new concepts of race and racism. In recent years, however, color consciousness and white supremacy appear to have been increasingly united, globalized, and commodified, as exemplified by the global multibillion-dollar skin-lightening industry. Finally, we document the growing methodological attention to measurements of skin color and social science data that incorporate skin color measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social networks are heavily implicated in large-scale social transformations. They are both transformed and transformative. We review the ways in which social networks act as agents of change in macrohistorical processes, stressing two distinct theoretical approaches. Formalism analyzes the structure of networks. Relationalism evaluates the linking properties of networks. Using these two approaches to organize the literature, we present the current state of knowledge on the effects of social networks for four central macrohistorical outcomes: civil uprising, state formation, global and national policy formation and diffusion, and economic development and increasing inequality. We then consider new theoretical advances in institutional emergence and methodological innovations in computational modeling and their potential for reconciling and advancing existing findings and approaches on the effects of social networks on macrosocial change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is widely assumed that the use of medical care will lead to improvements in health, yet questions remain about the medical system's contributions to health disparities. In this review, we examine these issues with a specific focus on how health care systems may actually generate or exacerbate health disparities. We review current knowledge about inequality and bias in the health care system, including the epidemiology of such patterns and their underlying mechanisms. Over the past three decades, we observe growth in our knowledge about provider cognitive and psychological processing, including the development of precision measuring tools to analyze provider bias, racial and otherwise. In the same timeframe we observe decreased emphasis on social, interactional, organizational, and structural factors that shape variation in medical treatment. We frame our discussion within a modified social ecological model and discuss tools for moving forward and reinvigorating sociological presence in this important research area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expansion of the penal system has been one of the most dramatic trends in contemporary American society. A wealth of research has examined the impact of incarceration on a range of later life outcomes and has considered how the penal system has emerged as a mechanism of stratification and inequality in the United States. In this article, we review the literature from a comparatively new vein of this research: the impact of incarceration on health outcomes. We first consider the impact of incarceration on a range of individual outcomes, from chronic health conditions to mortality. We then consider outcomes beyond the individual, including the health of family members and community health outcomes. Next, we discuss mechanisms linking incarceration and health outcomes before closing with a consideration of limitations in the field and directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the development of the sociology of consumption. It identifies three periods in its evolution: origins prior to the 1980s; the years between the 1980s and the mid-2000s under the influence of the cultural turn; and the subsequent decade, when new theoretical perspectives and political issues have emerged. Achievements of the second period are reviewed and three areas of fresh and productive recent research are identified: cultural consumption and its intersection with inequality and stratification, sustainable consumption and the organization of everyday life in Western societies, and the politics of consumption. The article concludes with a discussion of possibilities for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the environmental dimensions of human migration has made important strides in recent years. However, findings have been spread across multiple disciplines with wide-ranging methodologies and limited theoretical development. This article reviews key findings of the field and identifies future directions for sociological research. We contend that the field has moved beyond linear environmental 'push' theories toward a greater integration of context, including micro-level, meso-level, and macro-level interactions. We highlight findings that migration is often a household strategy to diversify risk (new economics of labor migration theory), interacting with household composition; individual characteristics; social networks; and historical, political, and economic contexts. We highlight promising developments in the field, including the recognition that migration is a long-standing form of environmental adaptation and yet only one among many forms of adaptation. Finally, we argue that sociologists could contribute significantly to migration-environment inquiry through attention to issues of inequality, perceptions, and agency vis-à-vis structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term intersectionality references the critical insight that race, class, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, nation, ability, and age operate not as unitary, mutually exclusive entities, but rather as reciprocally constructing phenomena. Despite this general consensus, definitions of what counts as intersectionality are far from clear. In this article, I analyze intersectionality as a knowledge project whose raison d'être lies in its attentiveness to power relations and social inequalities. I examine three interdependent sets of concerns: ( a) intersectionality as a field of study that is situated within the power relations that it studies; ( b) intersectionality as an analytical strategy that provides new angles of vision on social phenomena; and ( c) intersectionality as critical praxis that informs social justice projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine how recent immigration to the United States has affected African Americans. We first review the research on the growing diversity within the black population, driven largely by the presence of black immigrants from the Caribbean and Africa. As their children and grandchildren come of age, relations between immigrants and African Americans are complicated by the fact that a growing portion of the African American community has origins in both groups. We then review literature on both new destinations and established gateway cities to illustrate the patterns of cooperation, competition, and avoidance between immigrants of diverse races and African Americans in neighborhoods, the labor market, and politics. We explore the implications of the population's increasing racial diversity owing to immigration for policies that aim to promote racial equality but that are framed in terms of diversity. We conclude with suggestions for new areas of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Though war has long been a neglected topic in the social sciences, we now look back on several decades of systematic research. This review first summarizes the main strands of recent research in political science, where the most influential studies and well-structured debates have emerged. It then outlines four main contributions made by political, cultural, and comparative historical sociologists: the study of ideological, cultural, and legitimation processes leading to and being shaped by war; configurations of political power and inequality as causes and outcomes of war; how wars influence and are influenced by organizational developments (including of state capacity); and the long-term causal forces that produce macro-level regularities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review focuses on three topics that have dominated the sociological literature on HIV/AIDS in the United States: ( a) the demographics of the epidemic and the dynamics of structural-, neighborhood-, and individual-level risk; ( b) the lived experiences of HIV-positive people; and ( c) the collective response to HIV/AIDS through community-based services, political activism and social movements, and public policy. Sociologists have pursued inquiry in all of these areas and have often advanced the implicit and explicit use of approaches that reveal the epidemic's embedded power relations. Previous research and the dynamics of the epidemic suggest a fundamental argument: HIV/AIDS is an epidemic of intersectional inequality that is fueled by racial, gender, class, and sexual inequities at the macro-structural, meso-institutional, and micro-interpersonal levels. These inequalities significantly shape the likelihood of exposure to the virus; the realities of living with the infection; and medical, programmatic, political, and social-scientific responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prompted by new data and a renewed concern about equality of opportunity, the study of intergenerational mobility has flourished in Latin America in the past decade. Although analysis is still restricted to a handful of countries, one conclusion appears clear: Intergenerational income mobility is weaker in Latin America than in industrial countries and is characterized by 'persistence at the top,' a pattern consistent with the high levels of economic concentration in the region. However, social class mobility in Latin America does not differ from that in the industrialized world. This essay reviews two generations of mobility research since the 1960s, takes stock of current findings on economic and class mobility in Latin America, examines the linkages between mobility and macro-level factors, and engages a new literature on equality of opportunity. I suggest that the comparative understanding of mobility in Latin America can inform and inspire research in the industrialized world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Students of social inequality have noted the presence of mechanisms militating toward cumulative advantage and increasing inequality. Social scientists have established that individuals' choices are influenced by those of their network peers in many social domains. We suggest that the ubiquity of network effects and tendencies toward cumulative advantage are related. Inequality is exacerbated when effects of individual differences are multiplied by social networks: when persons must decide whether to adopt beneficial practices; when network externalities, social learning, or normative pressures influence adoption decisions; and when networks are homophilous with respect to individual characteristics that predict such decisions. We review evidence from literatures on network effects on technology, labor markets, education, demography, and health; identify several mechanisms through which networks may generate higher levels of inequality than one would expect based on differences in initial endowments alone; consider cases in which network effects may ameliorate inequality; and describe research priorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rising income inequality from the mid-1990s to the present was characterized by rapid income growth among top earners and new patterns of employment and income pooling across families and households. Research on economic inequality expanded from a more narrow focus on wage inequalities and labor markets to other domains including incentive pay, corporate governance, income pooling and family formation, social and economic policy, and political institutions. We review and provide a critical discussion of recent research in these new domains and suggest areas where sociological research may provide new insight into the character and causes of contemporary income inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We review the comparative literature on the impact of national-level educational institutions on inequality in student achievement. We focus on two types of institutions that characterize the educational system of a country: the system of school-type differentiation (between-school tracking) and the level of standardization (e.g., with regard to central examinations and school autonomy). Two types of inequality are examined: inequality in terms of dispersion of student test scores and inequality of opportunity by social background and race/ethnicity. We conclude from this literature, which mostly uses PISA, TIMSS, and/or PIRLS data, that inequalities are magnified by national-level tracking institutions and that standardization decreases inequality. Methodological issues are discussed, and possible avenues for further research are suggested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Market transitions are thought to inevitably produce spiraling inequality on the road to economic growth. This review provides an overview of research evaluating inequality in income and wages in Central and Eastern Europe since 1989. The empirical studies agree that inequality has increased, but disagree about the amount, pace, source, and explanation of change. Patterns of inequality are unrelated to economic performance, to the pace or timing of reform, or to rates of subsequent growth. Inequality increased the most in the least successful countries and the least in those countries with historic cultural connections to the West. Inequalities by age, education, region of the country, and health status increased; differences by gender appear to have declined. Although data are plentiful and promising, it is not yet possible to conclude that patterns of inequality among postcommunist countries are due to the genesis of capitalism, to social and cultural assimilation to the West, to adaptations of redistributive institutions to deal with poverty and unemployment, or to globalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Care work is done in the home as well as in markets for pay. Five theoretical frameworks have been developed to conceptualize care work; the frameworks sometimes offer competing answers to the same questions, and other times address distinct questions. The "devaluation" perspective argues that care work is badly rewarded because care is associated with women, and often women of color. The "public good" framework points out that care work provides benefits far beyond those to the direct recipient and suggests that the low pay of care work is a special case of the failure of markets to reward public goods. The "prisoner of love" framework argues that the intrinsic caring motives of care workers allow employers to more easily get away with paying care workers less. Instead of seeing the emotional satisfactions of giving care as its own reward, the "commodification of emotion" framework focuses on emotional harm to workers when they have to sell services that use an intimate part of themselves. The "love and money" framework argues against dichotomous views in which markets are seen as antithetical to true care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1995, Sampson & Wilson assessed the state of knowledge on race and violence and set forth an approach for future research. We review macrostructural analyses of race, ethnicity, and violent crime since 1995 to evaluate progress in explaining inequality in criminal violence across racial and ethnic groups. Among the important advances are studies that attempt to gain insights from explicit comparisons of racially distinct but structurally similar communities, expansion of work beyond the black-white divide, and incorporation of macrostructural factors into multilevel models of racial/ethnic differences in violence. Yet, progress is limited in all these directions, and additional questions remain. Thus, we offer a perspective and suggestions for future research that will expand knowledge on this important topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We define the knowledge economy as production and services based on knowledge-intensive activities that contribute to an accelerated pace of technical and scientific advance, as well as rapid obsolescence. The key component of a knowledge economy is a greater reliance on intellectual capabilities than on physical inputs or natural resources. We provide evidence drawn from patent data to document an upsurge in knowledge production and show that this expansion is driven by the emergence of new industries. We then review the contentious literature that assesses whether recent technological advances have raised productivity. We examine the debate over whether new forms of work that embody technological change have generated more worker autonomy or greater managerial control. Finally, we assess the distributional consequences of a knowledge-based economy with respect to growing inequality in wages and high-quality jobs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the concept of boundaries has been at the center of influential research agendas in anthropology, history, political science, social psychology, and sociology. This article surveys some of these developments while describing the value added provided by the concept, particularly concerning the study of relational processes. It discusses literatures on (a) social and collective identity; (b) class, ethnic/racial, and gender/sex inequality; (c) professions, knowledge, and science; and (d) communities, national identities, and spatial boundaries. It points to similar processes at work across a range of institutions and social locations. It also suggests paths for further developments, focusing on the relationship between social and symbolic boundaries, cultural mechanisms for the production of boundaries, difference and hybridity, and cultural membership and group classifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of financial markets, money, and banking is largely considered the purview of economics. Yet sociologists have contributed greatly to understanding financial relations since the early history of the discipline. This review begins with an overview of classical sociological approaches to financial markets, money, and banking and then describes how research in these areas exploded in recent decades. I describe the current state of research on money, relations among firms and banks, and interlocking directorates. I consider the ways financial relations shape firm behaviors and processes, and I describe the growing body of work that treats financial markets as outcomes. I discuss research on the transformation of financial systems during transition from state socialism, and I conclude with a discussion of a growing literature that combines studies of financial markets and social stratification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This chapter surveys sociological approaches to the study of job authority, including theoretical foundations, measurement, and emergence as an important dimension of social inequality. The focus here is mainly on studies of race and gender differences in the determinants of authority and the consequences of race and gender differences in authority for income. Despite significant advancements in the overall socioeconomic status of minorities and working women, race and gender remain important impediments to their attainment of authority. This pattern, which is consistent and robust in state-level, national, cross-national, and cross-temporal studies, is sustained net of an incumbent's human capital investments and structural location within and between several economic units. Following a review of the predominant explanations for gender and racial disparities in job authority is the conclusion that the most promising explanations for persistent racial and gender disparities in authority concern the racial and gender demography of the workplace and the tendency on the part of authority elites to reproduce themselves through both exclusionary and inclusionary processes. Suggestions for future research include additional delineation of these processes based on samples of multiple racial/ethnic groups of men and women and studies that synthesize quantitative and qualitative approaches to understanding the effects of employer and employee attitudes/preferences and practices on the authority attainment process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay reviews post-1980 research on class stratification, socio-economic inequalities, and social mobility in the People's Republic of China. Chinese class stratification has transformed from a rigid status hierarchy under Mao to an open, evolving class system in the post-Mao period. Socioeconomic inequalities have also been altered. State redistributive inequalities are giving way to patterns increasingly generated by how individuals and groups succeed in a growing market-oriented economy; rigorous empirical studies have been conducted on occupational prestige, income distribution, housing and consumption, and gender inequality. Finally, occupational mobility, a rare opportunity under Mao, is becoming a living experience for many Chinese in light of emerging labor markets. Scholarly works on status attainment, career mobility, and employment processes show both stability and change in the once politicized social mobility regime. There is relatively richer research output on urban than on rural China, despite the greater and more profound transformations that occurred in rural China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Median income in the United States has fallen and the distribution of income has grown markedly more unequal over the past three decades, reversing a general pattern of earnings growth and equalization dating back to 1929. Median trends were not the same for all groups-women's earnings generally increased-but the growth in earnings inequality has been experienced by all groups. Even white men employed full-time, year-round-traditionally the most privileged and secure group-could not escape wage stagnation and polarization. These patterns suggest research questions that go beyond conventional sociological interest in racial and gender wage gaps, refocusing attention on more general changes in labor market dynamics. The debates over the origins of the rise in US inequality cover a wide range of issues that can be roughly grouped into four categories: the changing demographics of the labor force, the impact of economic restructuring, the role of political context and institutions, and the dynamics of globalization. We review the empirical literature here, and challenge the field of sociology to reconstruct its research agenda on stratification and inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For most of the past 50 years, South Africa served as the outlier in sociological discussions of racial inequality: From the late 1940s, when most of the world was moving away from strict racial classification and segregation, apartheid provided social scientists with their most extreme example of the dynamics of racial segregation and exclusion. Yet while apartheid South Africa was unique, social scientists have also used it in comparative studies to explore the underlying dynamics of racial capitalism: Insights from South Africa have offered sociologists new ways to think about migrant labor; the construction of ethnicity; racial exclusion and colonial relationships; relationships between business, white workers and capitalist states; and oppositional social movements. With the end of legal apartheid, South Africa is poised to move into a new position in the annals of social science. From being an outlier, it is increasingly used an exemplar, in discussions of democratic transitions, development strategies and globalization, and post- colonial transformations. Still to come, perhaps, are comparative studies that draw on insights from other parts of the world to re-examine aspects of South African society that have been left relatively unexplored ironically including issues around racial identities and changing patterns of race relations as South Africa constructs a new non-racial democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The gender system includes processes that both define males and females as different in socially significant ways and justify inequality on the basis of that difference. Gender is different from other forms of social inequality in that men and women interact extensively within families and households and in other role relations. This high rate of contact between men and women raises important questions about how interaction creates experiences that confirm, or potentially could undermine, the beliefs about gender difference and inequality that underlie the gender system, Any theory of gender difference and inequality must accommodate three basic findings from research on interaction. (a). People perceive gender differences to be pervasive in inter- action, (b), Studies of interaction among peers with equal power and status show few gender differences in behavior, (c), Most interactions between men and women occur in the structural context of roles or status relationships that are unequal, These status and power differences create very real inter- action effects, which are often confounded with gender, Beliefs about gender difference combine with structurally unequal relationships to perpetuate status beliefs, leading men and women to recreate the gender system in everyday interaction, Only peer interactions that are not driven by cultural beliefs about the general competence of men and women or interactions in which women are status- or power-advantaged over men are likely to undermine the gender system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although it is evident in routine decision-making and a crucial vehicle of rationalization, commensuration as a general social process has been given little consideration by sociologists. This article defines commensuration as the comparison of different entities according to a common metric, notes commensuration's long history as an instrument of social thought, analyzes commensuration as a mode of power, and discusses the cognitive and political stakes inherent in calling something incommensurable. We provide a framework for future empirical study of commensuration and demonstrate how this analytic focus can inform established fields of sociological inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The deteriorating economic well-being of children portends less well-adjusted adults and a diminished economic future for America. A disproportionate share of today's poor children will become tomorrow's poor adults. This chapter discusses the concept, definition, and measurement of children's economic well-being and poverty. Children's current economic well-being is evaluated in comparative perspective-international, historical, and demographic. The chapter also evaluates the etiology of changes in children's absolute and relative economic well-being, focusing especially on the role of the changing family, parental employment, and levels of social provision for poor families. These "causes" are then evaluated in the context of recent public policy debates, including the devolution of federal welfare programs to the states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]