Do you believe that, in the modern USA, we live in a stratified society? Why or why not? Do you believe that our average work load today is more or less than (or the same as) that of ancient hunting and gathering societies? Why?
Anonymous
When we were hunter gatherers, we lived in social groups with multiple males bonded together to hunt and defend the group against dangerous animals like wolves, lions, and hyenas. Because bonding and sharing are needed, there was no elite leaders who get more than others. When an animal has been killed, the meat is shared among all people because there is more than enough for everybody and there was no refrigeration to save any surpluses. No leader, no matter how strong or smart, can deprive other males of sex with women in the group. When Europeans came to America, they found that native Americans were still hunter gatherers, and native American women are allowed to have sex with anybody, except that incest is not allowed. This was probably the way people behaved until quite recently, when agriculture was invented after the last ice aged ended 13,000 years ago.
In many parts of the world, people started practicing agriculture. Instead of living a nomadic lifestyle traveling in groups of multiple males and females and children of uncertain paternity (since men and women are both promiscuous). Men can now settle down permanently and grow enough food to raise their own families. Whenever males provide parental care in natuer (e.g. birds), they demand monogamy because males suffer if they become cuckolds by wasting resources raising offspring that are not their own. Male birds will guard females to prevent cheating (although cheating still happens because in birds, mating only takes a few seconds. Agriculture provides a steady source of food, so that hunting success is no longer as important. Besides agriculture, people also domesticated animals for food. The steady food source increased the population. People started settling down into villages, and villages expanded, eventually into cities and towns.
When populations increase, there are people who do not have to be farmers. instead they became craftsmen of all types. People can now accrue wealth and property, something that was not possible when people hunted and gathered daily to survive. Wealth and property need to be protected, and they can stolen and robbed. There is now a need for law and order. People can now gang up and become militias. They can go into towns to rob and steal. Obviously, there would be need for law and order and also armies. The leaders of armies can become rulers of towns, cities, and even large regions.
Not long after armies and armed gangs of thieves came into existence, we see leaders of these groups become greedy and they want to live in luxury compared to the average person. Therefore we can blame agriculture for societies becoming stratified all over the world. The greed does not stop with fighting wars with neighbors. City states like Rome became vast empires. Brits built an empire so large that they said that the sun never sets on the British Empire. All modern societies are stratified.
Gray Bold
Yes, our society is stratified. Civilization refers to human cultures that are measured by their division of labor and occupational specialization. Our work load today is comparable to agricultural societies. But, cultures that support themselves by hunting and gatherering spend less time doing so.