Channels of Inequality of Opportunity: The Role of Education and Occupation in Europe

Inequality of Opportunity (IO) refers to that inequality stemming from factors, called circumstances, beyond the scope of individual responsibility, such as gender, race, place of birth or socioeconomic background. In general, circumstances do not directly convert into future individual’s income. In...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social indicators research 2019-06, Vol.143 (3), p.1045-1074
Main Authors: Palomino, Juan C., Marrero, Gustavo A., Rodríguez, Juan G.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Childhood
Classification
Education
Educational attainment
Equal opportunities
Equal opportunity
Government spending
Human Geography
Income
Individual responsibility
Inequality
Intergenerational relationships
Intergenerational transmission
Microeconomics
Occupations
Public Health
Quality of Life Research
Race
Responsibility
Role of Education
Social research
Social Sciences
Socioeconomic Background
Socioeconomic status
Sociology
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Summary:Inequality of Opportunity (IO) refers to that inequality stemming from factors, called circumstances, beyond the scope of individual responsibility, such as gender, race, place of birth or socioeconomic background. In general, circumstances do not directly convert into future individual’s income. Indeed, different circumstances in childhood lead to different levels of education and different occupational categories which, in turn, contribute to generate divergent levels of income during adulthood. Using the Intergenerational Transmission modules in 2005 and 2011 from the EU-SILC, we estimate the importance of attained education and occupational category as mediating channels in the generation of IO in 26 European countries. We find that the attained level of education channels up to 30% of total IO, with important differences across Europe. Once attained education is taken into account, occupation explains less than 5% of IO in most countries. Moreover, the importance of education as a channel for IO is negatively correlated both with the share of the population that attains tertiary levels of education and with the importance of government expenditure in education relative to GDP.
ISSN:0303-8300
1573-0921
DOI:10.1007/s11205-018-2008-y