Mothers, Schools, and the Making of American Human Capital Mobility

Lukas Althoff, Harriet M. Brookes Gray and Hugo Reichardt

No 35152, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: How did the US become a land of opportunity? Previous historical research on intergenerational mobility has focused on father-son income correlations, masking the role of mothers. We introduce a new mobility measure that incorporates both parents' human capital, develop a latent variable method leveraging literacy as a proxy, and construct a representative linked panel that includes women. We find that intergenerational mobility—in both human capital and income—rose sharply from the 19th to the 20th century. Initially, maternal human capital was most predictive of children's outcomes. However, as schooling expanded, this reliance declined and intergenerational mobility rose. America's investment in mass education has therefore been central to its rise as a mobile society.

JEL-codes: C1 H10 H4 I20 J62 N0 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-04
Note: CH DAE ED LS PE
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