What does stratification mean in terms of inequality?

Stratification is the phenomenon in which the people in a
society are differentiated in terms of the amount of wealth (or other resources) that
they possess.  In other words, stratification exists if various groups in a society have
very different levels of wealth, power, or other important
resources.

Issues of stratification are quite central to
much of sociology and to other social sciences as well.  Sociologists might ask, for
example, why African Americans tend to have less wealth, less education, etc. than white
Americans do.  Social scientists might also ask why women are less represented in
positions of power than men are.  Both of these are forms of
stratification.

So, as the link below
says,

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The term stratification in
sociology is usually applied to studies of structured social href="../../oxsoc-encyclopedia/inequality">inequality; that is, studies of
any systematic inequalities between groups of people, which arise as the unintended
consequence of social processes and
relationships.