Social Mobility in Western Countries: The Role of Families, Networks, and Institutions

Martin Nybom, Rodríguez Mora, José V and Kjell G Salvanes

No 21308, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: This paper reviews recent advances on the drivers of intergenerational persistence in education and income, with a focus on causal mechanisms shaping social mobility across OECD countries. While the descriptive literature is vast, documenting substantial correlations between parents' and children's outcomes, recent research increasingly emphasizes the underlying factors driving these patterns. We begin with a brief illustration of global variation in intergenerational mobility using harmonized cross-country data, before turning to the literature on mechanisms. We outline a general theoretical framework, which organizes the discussion around three domains: pre-market factors (e.g., early childhood investment, parenting, education systems), labor market dynamics (e.g., sorting, networks, firm heterogeneity), and post-market institutions. We review topics such as the timing and nature of parental investments, parenting styles, credit constraints, neighborhood effects, and the role of social networks in school and on the labor market. We highlight how new data and empirical designs have broadened our understanding of the drivers of intergenerational inequality and ultimately which interventions that have the potential to mitigate it.

Keywords: Neighborhoods; Labor market (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D85 J13 J62 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-03
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP21308 (application/pdf)

Related works:
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:cpr:ceprdp:21308

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP21308

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CEPR ().