Earnings mobility among Italian low-paid workers

This paper uses Italian panel data to analyse low pay transitions since the early 1990s. Results indicate that having more human capital reduces the probability of falling into low pay, but there is little impact on raising exit rates from low pay. Human capital effects are found to be larger for women than for men. There is considerable state dependence: the experience of low pay raises the probability of subsequent low pay episodes. Also, there is substantial unobserved heterogeneity associated with factors such as initial conditions, mobility out of the earnings distribution and educational attainment.

Notions of self: lived realities of children with disabilities

To research children’s notions of self, semi‐structured interviews, drawings and focused group discussions were used with 14 children with mobility ‘impairments’ aged 11–16 years. The objective was to capture children’s ‘lived realities’. Findings illuminated immense variation and fluidity in children’s understanding of ‘disability’. Children desired to appear similar to ‘non‐disabled’ children. Most attributed ‘disability’ to existential causes. Parents’ ambivalent attitudes and societal reactions to ‘disabled’ children are discussed. The study points out the unremitting hope and potential of these children, which is often silenced by the overarching ‘negativism’ that surrounds ‘disability’.     

Feeling European: an exploration of ethnic disparities among immigrants

Over the last 20 years, European identity has become a key topic widely investigated in social sciences. However, most research has only focused on EU nationals and EU immigrants, neglecting the fact that a substantial segment of citizens in Europe are non-EU immigrants. This article explores the differences between and within EU and non-EU immigrant groups in terms of European identity and potential factors behind these differences. Based on the 2013 IAB-SOEP Migration Sample of first generation immigrants in Germany (N?=?2581), this paper reveals that non-EU immigrants tend to identify as European – even if to a lesser extent than EU immigrants. Moreover it provides a systematic comparative exploration of different factors possibly able to foster a European identity among EU and non-EU immigrants. It reveals, for instance, that religious affiliation has no significant impact but that spatial mobility is especially important in accounting for patterns in ethnic disparities in the endorsement of a European identity. Furthermore, this article illuminates a positive association between European identity and identity with the receiving society among both EU and non-EU immigrants as well as a positive association between European identity and identification with the origin country among EU immigrants.     

Neighborhood poverty and children’s exposure to danger: Examining gender differences in impacts of the Moving to Opportunity experiment

The Moving to Opportunity (MTO) program offered public housing residents in distressed communities a chance to move to low-poverty neighborhoods. The present study examined whether the resulting decline in neighborhood poverty led to lower levels of exposure to danger among children and youth ages 8-19 years old (n = 4606), and specifically, if there was a gender difference that matched the pattern of more beneficial program effects for girls and more adverse affects for boys. The study goes beyond previous research by using fixed effects to control for family factors that may influence moving behavior and confound estimates of gender differences in program impacts. Results showed that children experienced a decline in exposure to danger, with one key gender difference. Models based on brother-sister comparisons indicated that MTO had a more beneficial impact on exposure to drug activity for females than males. The findings suggest that neighborhood poverty is tied to children’s exposure to danger. Moreover, exposure to drug activity may help explain the gender differences in impacts on children’s mental health and risky behavior.     

Intergenerational effects of shifts in women’s educational distribution in South Korea: Transmission, differential fertility, and assortative mating

This study examines the intergenerational effects of changes in women’s education in South Korea. We define intergenerational effects as changes in the distribution of educational attainment in an offspring generation associated with the changes in a parental generation. Departing from the previous approach in research on social mobility that has focused on intergenerational association, we examine the changes in the distribution of educational attainment across generations. Using a simulation method based on Mare and Maralani’s recursive population renewal model, we examine how intergenerational transmission, assortative mating, and differential fertility influence intergenerational effects. The results point to the following conclusions. First, we find a positive intergenerational effect: improvement in women’s education leads to improvement in daughter’s education. Second, we find that the magnitude of intergenerational effects substantially depends on assortative marriage and differential fertility: assortative mating amplifies and differential fertility dampens the intergenerational effects. Third, intergenerational effects become bigger for the less educated and smaller for the better educated over time, which is a consequence of educational expansion. We compare our results with Mare and Maralani’s original Indonesian study to illustrate how the model of intergenerational effects works in different socioeconomic circumstances.     

Buffering income loss due to unemployment: Family and welfare state influences on income after job loss in the United States and western Germany

This article analyzes how the family and the welfare state influence household income trajectories after job loss in the United States and in western Germany. Drawing on panel data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP), I study the income buffering effects of the family and the welfare state in the short an in the long run after job loss. I demonstrate that household income trajectories after job loss in the two countries are similar for couple households. However, men in the United States rely relatively more on family resources to overcome income loss, whereas German men’s incomes are secured mostly by the welfare state. Women’s unemployment in both countries is mainly buffered by their partners’ higher earnings. Because single households have no access to family support, they face much higher losses in the United States than in Germany. I also show that the more generous German welfare state triggers less private self-help in the form of increased labor force participation on the part of women when their partners lose their jobs. Over time, the family has become more important in buffering incomes after job loss in the United States which smoothed men’s and roughened women’s income trajectories in couple households. In Germany, worsening re-employment chances increased income losses in the long run after job loss.     

Social closure,micro‐class immobility and the intergenerational reproduction of the upper class: a comparative study

This article assesses how processes of social closure enhance intergenerational immobility in the regulated professions and thus promote persistence at the top of the occupational hierarchy. We compare four European countries (GB, Germany, Denmark and Sweden) that differ considerably in their degree of professional regulation and in their broader institutional arrangements. We run log‐linear and logistic regression models on a cumulative dataset based on three large‐scale surveys with detailed and highly comparable information at the level of unit occupations. Our analyses indicate that children of licensed professionals are far more likely to inherit the occupation of their parents and that this stronger micro‐class immobility translates into higher chances of persistence in the upper class. These results support social closure theory and confirm the relevance of a micro‐class approach for the explanation of social fluidity and of its cross‐national variations. Moreover, we find that, when children of professionals do not reproduce the micro‐class of their parents, they still display disproportionate chances of persistence in professional employment. Hence, on the one hand, processes of social closure erect barriers between professions and fuel micro‐class immobility at the top. On the other hand, the cultural proximity of different professional groups drives intense intergenerational exchanges between them. Our analyses indicate that these micro‐ and meso‐class rigidities work as complementary routes to immobility at the top.     

Why have relative rates of class mobility become more equal among women in Britain?

In a previous paper it has been shown that across three cohorts of men and women born in Britain in 1946, 1958 and 1970 a gender difference exists in regard to relative rates of class mobility. For men these rates display an essential stability but for women they become more equal. The aim of the present paper is to shed light on the causes of this trend—or, that is, of increasing social fluidity—among women. We begin by considering a refined version of the perverse fluidity hypothesis: that is, one that proposes that part‐time work leads to increasing downward worklife mobility among women that also entails downward intergenerational mobility and thus promotes greater fluidity. We do in fact find that the increase in fluidity is very largely, if not entirely, confined to women who have had at least one period of part‐time work. However, a more direct test of the hypothesis is not supportive. We are then led to investigate whether it is not that part‐time working itself is the crucial factor but rather that women who subsequently work part‐time already differ from those who do not at entry into employment. We find that eventual full‐ and part‐timers do not differ in their class origins nor, in any systematic way, in their educational qualifications. But there is a marked and increasing difference in the levels of employment at which they make their labour market entry. Eventual part‐timers are more likely than eventual full‐timers to enter in working‐class positions, regardless of their class origins and qualifications. Insofar as these women are from more advantaged origins, they would appear not to seek to exploit their advantages to the same extent as do full‐timers in order to advance their own work careers. And it is, then, in the downward mobility accepted by these women—who increase in number across the cohorts—that we would locate the main source of the weakening association between class origins and destinations that is revealed among women at large.     

Moving Up and Down the Ladder: Perceived Social Mobility and Emotional Dispositions Among South Florida's Immigrants

Migrating to a new country is often associated with difficulties such as social isolation, financial strain, language barriers, and cultural differences. Less is known about how social mobility brought about by migration may be related to the emotional dispositions of immigrants (also referred to as subjective well‐being). To examine this relationship, we utilize data from a representative sample of 1,268 first‐generation immigrants from 80 different countries living in South Florida. Changes in perceived social mobility between the homeland and the United States—moving up and down the socioeconomic ladder—are indeed associated with differences in immigrants' negative dispositions. We draw from literature on expectations, social comparisons, and subjective class status to explain these findings. We do not find a statistically significant association between changes in socioeconomic status and positive dispositions, which may suggest that losses outweigh migration‐related gains. Additionally, findings reveal that nondominant groups fare worse than Cubans (the dominant group in the region) with regard to dispositions. Social comparisons to the dominant ethnic group may explain this, as well as perceptions of relative deprivation experienced by groups not favored by immigration policies and underrepresented in social and economic institutions. We conclude by discussing implications on how negative emotional dispositions represent risk factors that could affect immigrants' mental health.     

Social unrest and the Highway Beautification Act of 1965

The recent series of very senseless shootings of both African American males and police officers are chilling visual demonstrations of the current degree of racial tension and social unrest in the United States. Stricter gun control laws are critically important but only part of the issue. Basic human and civil rights are at the heart of the issue. We must move toward a society in which individuals from varied backgrounds are valued, respected, and included. We must all accept the fact that we are all human beings and very much alike. This will require a national effort very similar to the Highway Beautification Act of 1965. We must adopt and implement policies that will specifically address multiple issues (discrimination, racism, marginalization, exclusion, implicit bias, and the lack of economic mobility) serving as drivers of our current social state. A key component should be increased investment in the educational system (starting in primary school) resulting in an increased college graduation rate and the development of curricula on race and racism and supporting cultural sensitivity and implicit bias training from kindergarten through professional schools.