Research Brief

Trends in educational and income mobility

This brief explores trends in educational and income mobility, highlighting disparities and policy implications across advanced and developing economies.

© Pexels/ Ketut Subiyanto

Key findings

  • Since the 1980s, by increasing the number of university places, American society has created opportunities for the worse-off to achieve higher educational attainments.
  • Educational mobility has increased but has translated into a modest increase in income mobility.
  • At the same time, downward mobility has decreased because the American system has ensured that children in highly educated and wealthy families are protected from intergenerational income falls.
  • The empirical analysis of income mobility in developing countries faces several challenges because of the lack of very long panel data.
  • In India, there is a high persistence in the family status. However, mobility has increased at the lower end of the fathers’ educational distribution, while has decreased at the top end of that distribution. Educational mobility is increasing for girls.
  • Policies – such as public child-care programs, tax credit schemes and education subsidies – may be beneficial, especially for children from low-income families. Governments should ease high-quality education and labour market access for disadvantaged people and increase the protection of workers against discrimination by race.

Additional details

Author(s)

  • Rossana Merola

References