Most "traditional" societies take an individual's sex, kinship, and age and fill status positions on this basis.   These three characteristics -- sex, kinship, and age -- are ones over which the individual has no control.

What are the societal benefits of filling status positions on the basis of ascription?
 

• Allows for a socialization process that begins very early and is very specific.
• To the extent that an ascriptive strategy is accepted as valid, and it is often given a "divine" rationale, social conflict and competition is minimized.
  
  

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What are the societal costs?
 
• It can be very inefficient.  An individual with very limited skills for a position might end up being placed in that position.  Example, an "idiot" king.
  
  

Most "modern" societies have normative systems that strive to fill status positions on the basis of some achieved characteristic of an individual:  education, a particular skill, experience, etc.  Use of ascription is often viewed as immoral and/or illegal in these societies.

What are the societal benefits of filling status positions on the basis of achievement?
 

• Efficiency.  To the extent that an achievement ideology is actually used to fill status positions, the best qualified individuals are placed in positions.
  
  

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What are the societal costs?
 
• Delayed socialization.  The longer society waits before filling a position, the better able it is to determine which individual has the best attributes for the position.  One doesn't find out if one gets into medical school until senior year in college, and if you don't gain entrance then the training you have received in college might not be appropriate for your eventual occupation.
• A heightened sense of competition.  To the extent that an achievement strategy is actual employed, then the individual must bear the responsibility for his or her position in the social structure.
• Since no society employs a totally achievement strategy of filling status positions, especially with regards to the continued influence of kinship, some degree of illegitimacy usually surrounds a society's achievement ideology.
  
  

What forces are operating to fuel this movement?
 

• Rapid rate of social change.

The social structures of modern societies are changing so rapidly that it is becoming impossible to socialize individuals for status positions that they might have to fill.  For example, can you imagine what occupational position your children might be asked to fill?


• Growing complexity of the division of labor.

The number of different positions in modern social structures have increased enormously, and increasingly specific skills are needed by individuals to adequately fill them.  We all do not have the skills and attributes needed to be an adequate diamond cutter, or professional pool player.
 
• Capitalist economic system.

When the production and distribution of a society's goods and services are regulated by market forces, enormous pressure builds on employers to fill occupational positions on the basic of individual skills and not ascriptive attributes.  Capital magnifies the significance of small differences in skill.  When a worker is given a $4.3 million earth-moving machine to operate, small differences in skill produce very large differences in output.