Socioeconomic Status Report

Education, occupation, and income all play an integral part in the make-up of an individuals combined socioeconomic status, better known as SES. It is considered to be a sociological measure of a person’s work experience and of an individual’s, or family’s, economic and social position (Baker 2014). Socioeconomic status plays a role in individuals transitions to employment, schooling, and social spheres (Scharoun-lee, et. al.,2011). However, in many cases SES plays an even profounder role in the make-up and the measure of an individual’s health outcomes. The intersection between health outcomes and socioeconomic status is often overlooked, due to clouding factors of policy and politics. However, now more than ever, as medicine moves into its

This paper aims to reflect on the effects of socioeconomic status and other social disparities on factors of childhood health; by first explaining what SES is, then delving into its connection to the dwindling health of adult individuals, and lastly showing how adults/parental SES can influence adolescent

One connection amongst researchers is that SES status has made a difference, health wise, in the lives of those that are on the lower end of the SES spectrum. Studies done on the matter have often found that the simple composite measures of SES (economic status, measured by income; social status, measured by education; and work status, measured by occupation), explained most of the variation in rates of mortality and morbidity across every disease and condition that was recognized by the CDC (Adler 1994). Even when the three factors of SES are split up and observed separately, each of the factors still has an individual association with health. Suggesting that those with lower SES are more susceptible to diseases and other risk factors that individuals with higher SES standing often do not come in contact with during their lifetimes. As seen in the table below, the CDC shows that those from lower affluence or socioeconomic status, consistently have higher percentages of prevalence for all of the health categories listed. Studies have found, that individuals, age 25, in lower SES levels were said to have a life expectancy of 6 years less than that of higher SES individual that was the same age (Chen). In addition, one study found that those from the lowest SES group are 2.5 times more likely to be hospitalized or visit the emergency department, and 3.5 times as likely to suffer activity