Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics
Working Paper Series,
IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy
No 2023:12: Skills, parental sorting, and child inequality
Martin Nybom (), Erik Plug (), Bas van der Klaauw () and Lennart Ziegler ()
Additional contact information
Martin Nybom: IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, Postal: Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy, P O Box 513, SE-751 20 Uppsala, Sweden
Erik Plug: University of Amsterdam, Postal: University of Amsterdam
Bas van der Klaauw: VU University Amsterdam, Postal: University of Amsterdam
Lennart Ziegler: University of Vienna, Postal: University of Vienna
Abstract: This paper formulates a simple skill and education model to illustrate how better access to higher education can lead to stronger assortative mating on skills of parents and more polarized skill and earnings distributions of children. Swedish data show that in the second half of the 20th century more skilled students increasingly enrolled in college and ended up with more skilled partners and more skilled children. Exploiting college expansions, we find that better college access increases both skill sorting in couples and skill and earnings inequality among their children. All findings support the notion that increased skill inequality contributes to rising earnings inequality.
Keywords: Assortative mating; intergenerational mobility; education; earnings inequality
Language: English
42 pages, May 8, 2023
Full text files
https://www.ifau.se/...nd-child-inequality/Full text
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