ABSTRACT
These days anyone who tries to explain, criticize, or influence major social inequalities in capitalist countries is likely to rely on the same basic model of how inequality comes about. The model features sorting of unequally endowed individuals into unequal positions, one by one. In its simplest versions, as the previous chapter explained, it contains just four elements: a set of positions—jobs, public offices, dwellings, prestige categories, and so on; a set of unequal rewards attached to those positions; a sorting mechanism that channels people to different positions; and individuals who vary in characteristics the sorting mechanism detects.
