Why the apple doesn't fall far: understanding intergenerational transmission of human capital

Paul Devereux, Sandra Black and Kjell G Salvanes

Open Access publications from School of Economics, University College Dublin

Abstract: This paper examines the causal relationship between parents' education and that of their children in Norway. In 1959, the Norwegian Parliament legislated a mandatory school reform. In addition, the reform standardized the curriculum and increased access to schools, since the nine years of mandatory school was eventually made available in all municipalities. Cohorts of parents born between 1947 and 1958 were included in the sample. In the case of the Norwegian reform, the increase in compulsory schooling had a significant effect on educational attainment at the bottom of the distribution. The primary effect of the reform was to reduce the proportion of people with fewer than nine years of education from 12 percent to three percent, with a new spike at nine years. For mothers, there is a positive effect of maternal education on the education of sons but no such relationship for daughters. The results indicate that the positive correlation between parents' education and children's education largely represents positive relationships between other factors that are correlated with education. These could be ability, family background, income, or other factors. It is also clear, however, that the effect of the reform on children's educational attainment is small, with only the mother/son pair demonstrating any real relationship.

Keywords: Educational attainment; Parent and child; Education, Compulsory--Norway (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 13 pages
Date: 2005-03
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (645)

Published in: American Economic Review, 95(1) 2005-03

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10197/309 Open Access version, 2005 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Why the Apple Doesn't Fall Far: Understanding Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital (2005)
Working Paper: Why the apple doesn't fall far: understanding intergenerational transmission of human capital (2004)
Working Paper: Why the apple doesn't fall far: understanding intergenerational transmission of human capital (2003)
Working Paper: Why the apple doesn't fall far: understanding intergenerational transmission of human capital (2003)
Working Paper: Why the Apple Doesn't Fall Far: Understanding Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital (2003)
Working Paper: Why the Apple Doesn't Fall Far: Understanding Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital (2003)
Working Paper: Why the apple doesn't fall far: understanding intergenerational transmission of human capital (2003)
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:ucn:oapubs:10197/309

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Open Access publications from School of Economics, University College Dublin Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Nicolas Clifton ().