An attempt to measure social stratification and changes in terms of social distances

Abstract

Background of INCASI Project H2020-MSCA-RISE-2015 GA 691004. WP1: Compilation

In the context of a research whose purpose was to analyse the changes in the social and economic model of Argentina in the period 1997-2006, we observed that the social structure, measured by a variable that typifies stratification, remains basically unchanged during the years analysed in spite of the profound crisis that occurred at the end of 2001 and along 2002. Within this general framework, the hypothesis that we believe is consistent with the observed behaviour is that the distance among social strata can be measured, in an objective way, taking into account the relative positions of the households with respect to primary goods, both intra temporarily (dispersion within the stratus) as well as inter temporarily (changes of the distance among strata). From the Data of the Permanent Survey of Households of Argentina and using Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Cluster Analysis, we have measured these distances in each moment of time. The results show that the distances among the strata express the changes in time, and that they increase during crisis. These distances, measured in terms of inertia in a multidimensional space and starting from the typologies obtained in each year, allow us to have a measure of the dynamics of the social change.