Vol. 5, Issue 1, Part A (2023)

Social inequality arises when resources are unequally distributed in a society, typically through distributional norms that produce certain patterns along socially defined categories of people. It possesses and creates gendered boundaries between individuals that limit women's access within society. Differential preferences in access to social goods in society are generated by power, religion, kinship, prestige, race, ethnicity, gender, age, sexual orientation, and class. Social inequality usually implies a lack of equality of outcomes, but it can also be understood as a lack of equality of opportunity. This goes hand in hand with the way inequality plays out in the social economy and the rights that emerge on that basis. Social rights include the labour market, source of income, health care, freedom of speech, education, political representation, and participation. Social inequality is the result of a lack of equality of outcomes.