In American Society Today. College students oftentimes find themselves having to work two jobs to stay afloat. This typical case of the American college student is due to the United States position in today’s global system economy. While many Americans have benefited from this economy’s tertiary economy. others are devastated and find themselves unemployed due to the creation ol multinational companies. Many aspects. including social, historical, political, and environmental, contribute to and maintain the balance of the global system in todays world. In the middle 1970s, a gentlemen named Immanuel Wallenstein purposed the concept of the modern worlds global or world system economy.
Within the global system, there are three classifications of economies in the world today. The first classification is the primary economy. A country with a primary economy is the least industrialized and deals stricktly with the fishing, farming, and mining of their lands natural resources. Examples of countries with a primary economy. also known as third world or peripheral nations, are Afghanistan, Mongolia, and many other eastern European nations. Countries with a primaiy economy tend to rely solely on selling their resources to other more industrialized countries. The second economic classification is the secondary, or semiperipheral economy.
Countries grouped in this level use the resources gathered by these third-world countries, and turn them into useful products through industry. America was at this level during the first three quarters of the 20th century, but has since become a post-industrial country, The incorporation of the multinational business has led to this trend in America, shifting most factory-blue collar jobs across the border to Mexico or abroad. Countries that do still fail in this level of classification are Greece, Portugal, and Mexico. all of which are also known second world countries. The third and highest level of classification in the global system is the teritary economy. This is the level that postindustrial America is grouped in today.
In the tertiary economy, most of the industrial level work is shifted from the mother country to foreign countries where wages can be set much lower. The result of the tertiary economy is very ambiguous. having both positive and negative effects. On the positive side of this economic development, is the increase in white collar jobs and secondary education. On the converse side is a devastating amount of unemployment With blue collar workers, as well as, an increase in inequality in America. While the rich get richer, the poor get poorer and stratification increases in America and other tertiary economies such as Germany, Luxembourg. and Japan, As a result of this service-oriented job market, citizens in tertiary economies have entirely different life styles than those in first and second world countries.
As a result of these three distinctive classifications, the world balances its economy through trade, exchange, and multinational corporations. The third-world companies provided the raw materials to the second world countries. Then, the second-world countries convert the new materials into usable products. Finally, the first world countries highly educated personal serVice these products. Servicing products could also mean writing software for computers or designing new technology to make products better. Ultimately, the third world countries consume most of the products that the first and second world countries are responsible for creating. The effect of the global economy on people’s lives is greatly different at the three distinct levels of the global system. People from third world countries live a life of hard manual labor, while inequality is not as high.
People from second-world countries also work hard manual labor, but pay is better, and their country benefits with growth. In the first world country, education is highly important with major growth occurring in the white collar job field, The American college student must work many of the lower paying serVice jobs to put themselves through school. So many of these jobs are available, that the pay is low and the demand for workers is high, The American economy has stepped to the forefront of the overall global system-style economy. Its emergence as a tertiary economy is a positive gain for the American people. Its concept provides for growth in education and further assurance that we will continue to enjoy a very highly innovated and CIVII society.