Two Levels of Understanding

Chapter 6 argues that there are two levels of understanding impoverishment. On one hand, it can be ascertained who is more likely to experience poverty through the impact that human capital exerts on creating individual economic vulnerability discussed in Chapter 4. On the other hand, why poverty occurs in the first place can be largely understood through failings at the structural level. These failings include a lack of decent-paying jobs and a weak social safety net. The analogy of musical chairs is used to illustrate these processes. Like a large-scale game of musical chairs, there are many more people competing for decent opportunities, such as livable wage jobs versus the number of such opportunities available. The chapter concludes by presenting a schematic model diagramming the structural vulnerability framework.