Political and Business Dynasties: a Social Gradient in Returns to Elite Education

Stéphane Benveniste

No 2410, AMSE Working Papers from Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France

Abstract: Dynasties constitute a visible sign of intergenerational persistence and raise questions about the legitimacy of the ruling elite. This paper uses data on graduates of elite colleges to explore the influence of political and business dynasties in France. I link nominative data on 103,309 graduates of 12 French Grandes ´ Ecoles born between 1931 and 1975 to their professional careers as politicians with national-level mandates or as board members of French firms. Identifying lineage through surnames, I find that sons of political and business leaders were substantially more likely than their graduate peers to pursue elite careers themselves, revealing a social gradient in returns to elite education. Political dynasties were particularly sizeable, although progressively declining. These dynasties also affected the composition of the French elite: fewer dynastical board members were graduates of top colleges than their first-generation colleagues. Yet, they were propelled much younger into top business and political positions.

Keywords: Dynasties; Returns to College Education; intergenerational mobility; Elite Occupations; Politics; Business; Grandes ´ Ecoles. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 I24 I26 J62 M51 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 56 pages
Date: 2024-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his, nep-lab and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.amse-aixmarseille.fr/sites/default/fil ... /wp_2024_-_nr_10.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Political and Business Dynasties: a Social Gradient in Returns to Elite Education (2024)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aim:wpaimx:2410

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in AMSE Working Papers from Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France AMU-AMSE - 5-9 Boulevard Maurice Bourdet, CS 50498 - 13205 Marseille Cedex 1. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Gregory Cornu ().