In all complex societies, the total stock of valued resources is distributed unequally, with the most privileged individuals and families receiving a disproportionate share of power, prestige, and other valued resources. The term "stratification system" refers to the constellation of social institutions that generate observed inequalities of this sort. The key components of such systems are (1) the institutional processes that define certain types of goods as valuable and desirable, (2) the rules of allocation that distribute those goods across various positions or occupations (e.g., doctor, farmer, "housewife"), and (3) the mobility mechanisms that link individuals to positions and generate unequal control over valued resources. The inequality of modern systems is thus produced by two conceptually distinct types of "matching" processes: The jobs, occupations, and social roles in society are first matched to "reward packages" of unequal value, and the individual members of society then are allocated to...