By multiplying the family food budget by four, the government arrives at a poverty income that can be adjusted for the number of people in the household and for changes in the cost of food. Poor children are less educated than those born into more affluent families. The poor are likely to live in overcrowded, infested housing that needs repairs like plumbing and heating. Poor people are more likely than members of the middle and upper classes to be arrested, indicted, convicted, and imprisoned, and they are apt to be given longer sentences for the same offenses. The structural explanations of poverty attribute it to dominant social institutions such as the dual market for labor.
Situational approach interprets the behavior of the poor as an adaptation to their environment.
Racial minorities are groups of people who share certain inherited characteristics such as eye folds or brown skin. Ethnic minorities are made up of people who share cultural features such as language, religion, national origin, dietary practices, and a common history, and who regard themselves as a distinct group. Assimilation occurs when the mainstream culture adapts their own unique cultural pattern to those of the majority, as well as intermarrying. Subordinate status is the principal characteristic of a minority group. Discrimination is the differential treatment of individuals considered to belong to a particular social group.