Measures Of Intergenerational Mobility Research Articles

Regional intergenerational mobility in Ecuador: many lands in one country

ABSTRACT We analyse the regional differences in eight measures of intergenerational mobility across cantons in Ecuador. Within-country estimates show heterogeneity with lands of opportunity, such as the Galápagos, and areas where poverty traps prevail, namely the Central Andes. This study also finds that better opportunities for children are associated with locations that have higher levels of migration, schooling, agriculture, family self-employment and oil activity, while inequality and the share of Indigenous people provide worse opportunities for mobility. These relationships are reinforced by spillovers across space, which, in Ecuador, are more likely to result in poverty cycles than privilege ones.

What makes people feel poor when they are economically non-poor? Investigating the role of intergenerational mobility and comparison with friends

This study examines how comparisons with “close others,” namely, parents and friends, influence the discrepancy between economic and subjective poverty. Comparison with parents reflects “intergenerational mobility” and “equality of opportunity,” whereas comparison with friends reflects “equality of outcome.” The data were drawn from the first wave of the Hong Kong Panel Survey for Poverty Alleviation (N = 2000). As suggested by the theories of fulfilled aspiration, falling-from-grace, self-serving bias and self-interest, I found that people who had experienced upward intergenerational mobility were more likely to feel non-poor even if they were economically poor, and that people who had experienced downward intergenerational mobility were more likely to feel poor even if they were economically non-poor. This association was found for subjective, but not for objective, measures of intergenerational mobility. When comparing themselves to friends, people made both downward and upward comparisons. As suggested by social comparison theory, those who contrasted their social status with their lower-status friends were more likely to feel non-poor, even if they were economically poor, whereas people who contrasted their social status with their higher-status friends were more likely to feel poor even if they were economically non-poor. Moreover, when considering both parents and friends as reference groups, I found that parents (equality of opportunity) appeared to be a more important reference group than friends (equality of outcome).

Intergenerational educational mobility in Bangladesh.

Social mobility is considered as an important indicator of the economic development of a country. However, it varies widely across geographical regions and social groups in developing countries like Bangladesh. This paper intends to evaluate the intergenerational mobility in Bangladesh across generations. This paper considers a nationally representative sample survey of 8,403 respondents (rural: 5,436 and urban: 2,967). The male and female respondents aged 23 years and above were included in the sample. The education attainment of a son or daughter as compared to their father's education level was considered as the measure of intergenerational mobility. Transition probability matrix and different social mobility indices were used to find out the intergenerational education mobility in Bangladesh. The findings reveal that approximately three-fourth (74.5%) of the respondents attained formal education, while more than half (58.3%) of the respondents' father was illiterate. The educational status of the respondents and their father who lived in urban areas was relatively better than who lived in rural areas. It is also observed that 91.2% and 81.6% of the intergenerational class movement was upward among sons and daughters respectively. The probability of a higher educated father will have a higher educated child is higher in urban areas than in rural areas of Bangladesh. The intergenerational mobility is higher in the primary, secondary, and higher secondary educational levels, though the illiterate and higher education levels are the least mobile classes. In addition, the limiting probabilities reveal that the chance of sending sons to schools by an illiterate father is less as compared to their daughters. Such difference is more obvious in the urban areas, i.e., it is highly likely that sons of the illiterate father are also illiterate. Bangladesh has been progressing remarkably in recent years. To keep the pace of the ongoing economic development in the country, it is necessary to give more attention to the illiterate people especially the girls who live in rural areas. The authors anticipate that the findings will be helpful for the policymakers as the relationship between inequality and intergenerational mobility is vital for several aspects of the economic development of a country.

Intergenerational Mobility in India: A Comparative Analysis of Social Groups

Using Indian Human Development Survey Data set for two rounds, 2004-05 and 2011-12, this paper studies patterns in intergenerational mobility (IGM) in India, and answers four key questions: one, what is the measure of intergenerational mobility in terms of education, occupation and income between fathers’ and sons’ generation; two, what is the direction of mobility, i.e. upward or downward direction; three, how far sons have moved away from their fathers; and four, how the mobility rates depend upon who the person is, i.e. we study the effect of hypothetically changing the social group of a person, ceteris paribus, on IGM. Our results show that over time, there is upward education mobility, and gaps in this mobility have reduced across social groups. However, such pattern is not visible in intergenerational occupation or income mobility, implying that educational advantages enjoyed by the son’s generation do not translate into occupational or income advantages.

What Determine Socioeconomic Mobility: Evidence from Pakistan

This paper examines the factors that influence the socioeconomic development of employees particularly those having poor financial backgrounds. We investigate the relationship between intergenerational socio-economic mobility and subjective well-being moreover. We look at different measures of intergenerational mobility — 1. social, 2. educational, 3. Occupational and 4. income mobility as well as 5. change in their socio-economic conditions. The mobility determinants under study included the individuals’ academics or level of their literacy along whit 2. their parents and family educational backgrounds, their prior economic status, and their financial status from what level of prosperity they use to belong, their siblings, children, and gender. To achieve this objective, this study adopted a questionnaire-based survey approach. A quantitative study was made by using a survey of about 370 responses. These individuals belong to different age groups, having different financial statuses, and having different social backgrounds. The data was analyzed using Structured Equation Modeling. The results suggested the number of children has a significant effect on downwards education mobility, however negatively affecting downwards income mobility and contributing to better socioeconomic conditions. However, the number of siblings positively affect upwards educational mobility but at the same time, downwards social mobility. Similarly, the level of self-education is negatively affecting education and income downwards mobility, hence contributing to the betterment of education. Father’s education level is causing an increase in social upward mobility but a decrease in occupation mobility, it is also contributing towards downwards income mobility. Mother education also seems to affect downwards social mobility as well as occupational mobility. Employees' prior economic status seems to negatively affect income downwards mobility, occupational mobility, as well as socioeconomic conditions. The key findings of this study suggest that both social backgrounds and levels of academic achievements have a significant impact on individual development in social and economic prosperity and play a significant role in the development and utilization of their skills.

Correlating Social Mobility and Economic Outcomes

We apply a novel measure of intergenerational mobility (IM) developed by Guell, Rodriguez Mora, and Telmer (2014) to a rich combination of Italian data allowing us to produce comparable measures of IM of income for 103 Italian provinces. We then exploit large heterogeneity across Italian provinces in terms of economic and social outcomes to explore how IM correlates with a variety of outcomes. We find that (i) higher IM is positively associated with a variety of good economic outcomes, such as higher value added per capita, higher employment, lower unemployment, higher schooling and higher openness and (ii) that also within Italy the Great Gatsby Curve exists: in provinces in which mobility is lower cross-sectional income inequality is larger. We finally explore correlation between IM and several socio-political outcomes, such as crime and life expectancy, but we do not find any clear systematic relationship on this respect.

Local Measures of Intergenerational Mobility of Income, Cognitive, and Noncognitive Skills

Using NLSY data we investigate whether the observed patterns of intergenerational persistence in cognitive and non-cognitive abilities are consistent with the predictions of the genetic hypothesis. In doing so we employ the varying coefficient model to estimate nonparametric (local) measures of intergenerational mobility of income, cognitive, and non-cognitive skills as smooth functions of log parent permanent income. Our findings show that intergenerational mobility exhibits nonlinear patterns. Individuals with different parental income are characterized by different degrees of intergenerational mobility. Moreover, we find evidence that suggests that the genetic component in the overall intergenerational transmission mechanism is much stronger than the epigenetic for both sons and daughters.

Inequality of Opportunity, Income Inequality and Economic Mobility: Some International Comparisons

Despite a recent surge in the number of studies attempting to measure inequality of opportunity in various countries, methodological differences have so far prevented meaningful international comparisons. This paper presents a comparison of ex-ante measures of inequality of economic opportunity (IEO) across 41 countries, and of the Human Opportunity Index (HOI) for 39 countries. It also examines international correlations between these indices and output per capita, income inequality, and intergenerational mobility. The analysis finds evidence of a Kuznets curve for inequality of opportunity, and finds that the IEO index is positively correlated with overall income inequality, and negatively with measures of intergenerational mobility, both in incomes and in years of schooling. The HOI is highly correlated with the Human Development Index, and its internal measure of inequality of opportunity yields very different country rankings from the IEO measure.

Intergenerational mobility and sample selection in short panels

AbstractUsing data from the first 11 waves of the BHPS, this paper measures the extent of the selection bias induced by standard coresidence conditions—bias that is expected to be severe in short panels—on measures of intergenerational mobility in occupational prestige. We try to limit the impact of other selection biases, such as those induced by labour market restrictions that are typically imposed in intergenerational mobility studies, by using different measures of socio‐economic status that account for missing labour market information. We stress four main results. First, there is evidence of an underestimation of the true intergenerational elasticity, the extent of which ranges between 12% and 39%. Second, the proposed methods used to correct for the selection bias seem to be unable to attenuate it, except for the propensity score weighting procedure, which performs well in most circumstances. This result is confirmed both under the assumption of missing‐at‐random data as well as under the assumption of not‐missing‐at‐random data. Third, the two previous sets of results (direction and extent of the bias, and differential abilities to correct for it) are also robust when we account for measurement error. Fourth, restricting the sample to a period shorter than the 11 waves under analysis leads to a severe sample selection bias. In the cases when the analysis is limited to eight waves, this bias ranges from about 40% to 65%. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Three Meanings of Intergenerational Mobility

We axiomatize three different motivations for being concerned about intergenerational mobility: mobility as a description of movement, as an indication of equality of opportunity, and as an indication of equality of life chances. These three motivations are shown to be incompatible. None of the existing measures is acceptable as an indicator of equality of opportunity or equality of life chances. We propose two new measures of intergenerational mobility which more adequately reflect these concerns.