Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

The author presents a nonparametric approach to measuring stratification that highlights the distinction between stratification and inequality. Using pairwise comparison of ranks, the author develops an index of stratification that gauges the overall degree to which population subgroups occupy distinct strata with respect to a hierarchical outcome. This new index possesses a number of desirable properties that are not satisfied by existing measures of stratification. The overall index can be decomposed as a weighted average of pair-specific indices of stratification, which capture the extent of separation between any two particular groups. Besides, this index can be easily extended to measure conditional stratification through control of a third variable. In addition, the author builds a parallel between stratification and inequality in their measurement by developing a general formula of which the index of stratification and the Gini index of inequality can be considered as two special cases. Finally, this new approach is applied to depict the temporal trends of wage stratification by gender, race, and educational attainment over the past three decades in the United States.

Keywords

Gini inequality pairwise comparison rank correlation stratification

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Cancio

S. A.

Evans

T. D.

Maume

D. J.

1996. “Reconsidering the Declining Signicance of Race: Racial Differences in Early Career of Wages.” American Sociological Review 61(4):541–56.

Dagum

1997. “A New Approach to the Decomposition of the Gini Income Inequality Ratio.” Empirical Economics 22(4):515–31.

Fischer

C. S.

Hout

2006. Century of Difference. New York: Russel Sage Foundation.

Greenhalgh

1985. “Sexual Stratification: The Other Side of ‘Growth with Equity’ in East Asia.” Population and Development Review 11(2):265–314.

Hagan

1990. “The Gender Stratification of Income Inequality among Lawyers.” Social Forces 68(3):835–55.

Kao

Thompson

J. S.

2003. “Racial and Ethnic Stratification in Educational Achievement and Attainment.” Annual Review of Sociology 29:417–42.

Kendall

M. G.

1955. Rank Correlation Methods. New York: Hafner.

Kim

Sakamoto

2008. “The Rise of Intra-occupational Wage Inequality in the United States, 1983 to 2002.” American Sociological Review 73(1):129–57.

Lasswell

1965. Class and Stratum. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

10.

Lenski

1984. “Income Stratification in the United States: Toward a Revised Model of the System.” Pp. 173–205 in Research in Social Stratification and Mobility, Vol. 3, edited by Treiman

Robinson

Greenwich, CT: JAI.

11.

Liao

T. F.

2006. “Measuring and Analyzing Class Inequality with the Gini Index Informed by Model-based Clustering.” Sociological Methodology 36(1):201–24.

12.

Liao

T. F.

2008. “The Gini Unbound: Analyzing Class Inequality with Model-based Clustering.” Pp. 201–21 in Advances on Income Inequality and Concentration Measures, edited by Betti

Lemmi

New York: Routledge.

13.

Mouw

Kalleberg

A. L.

2010. “Occupations and the Structure of Wage Inequality in the United States.” American Sociological Review 75(3):402–31.

14.

Ross

C. E.

Bird

C. E.

1994. “Sex Stratification and Health Lifestyle: Consequences for Men’s and Women’s Perceived Health.” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 35(2):161–78.

15.

Ross

1981. “Sex Stratification in the Workplace: Male-female Differences in Economic Returns to Occupation.” Social Science Research 10(3):195–224.

16.

Schwartz

Winship

1980. “The Welfare Approach to Measuring Inequality.” Sociological Methodology 11(1):1–36.

17.

Yitzhaki

Lerman

1991. “Income Stratification and Income Inequality.” Review of Income and Wealth 37(3):313–29.

A Nonparametric Index of Stratification

Abstract

Keywords

Get full access to this article

References