Between 1947 and 1974, income growth was distributed fairly evenly among households in various income groups. However, income inequality has increased over the past 30 or so years. Since the mid-1970s, real income growth for households at the 95th percentile of the distribution has grown at a pace nearly 3/2 times that of households at the 20th percentile. A similar pattern holds between men and women. The Gini coefficient (lower-left chart), a more complete measure of income inequality, considers the entire income distribution. It indicates that income inequality is rising overall. One explanation holds that the increasing disparity of income in the U.S. over the past 30 years results from skill-biased technological change that has benefited higher-skilled workers. The skill-biased hypothesis asserts that technology improvements boost the productivity (and hence the income) of skilled labor by more than it does the unskilled. Since the 1980s, demand for skilled labor has kept pace with the relatively greater supply of skilled workers (as estimated by the rising proportion of college-educated workers), exerting upward pressure on wages for higher-skilled workers. Since the early 1980s, the average real wage has risen roughly 30% for male college graduates and nearly 50% for males with a postgraduate degree. 0 25 50 75 100 125

Income Inequality : Understanding the Needs of Economically Disadvantaged Children and Families

Unequal Chances to Participate in Adult Learning: International Perspectives

The Sociology of Adult and Continuing Education.@@@Sociology of Adult Education.

This survey paper examines selected issues related to the intersection of three broad scholarly areas: numeracy, adult education, and vulnerability. Numeracy encompasses the ways in which people cope with the mathematical, quantitative, and statistical demands of adult life, and is viewed as an important outcome of schooling and as a foundational skill for all adults. The focus on vulnerability stems from the realization that concerns of policy makers and educators alike often center on populations seen as vulnerable. The paper is organized in five sections. After a brief introduction, Section 2 examines adult numeracy, focusing on five numeracy domains (health, financial, digital, civic, and workplace numeracy), literacy-numeracy linkages, functional and critical aspects of numeracy, and the centrality of numeracy practices, and notes sources of vulnerability for each of these. Section 3 sketches formal, non-formal and informal contexts in which adults learn or develop their numeracy, and examines factors that may be potential sources of vulnerability, including systemic factors and dispositional and affect factors. Section 4 reflects more broadly on the concept of vulnerability, introduces selected aspects of the papers published in this issue of ZDM Mathematics Education, and points to findings regarding adult learners who may be deemed vulnerable. The closing section summarizes conclusions and research directions regarding the intersection of the three core domains. Overall, the paper points to emerging research needs and educational challenges that are relevant to scholars, practitioners, and policy makers interested in developing the numeracy of adults as well as in the mathematics education of younger learners.

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11858-020-01155-9.pdf

Numeracy, adult education, and vulnerable adults: a critical view of a neglected field.

The influence of culture, history, economic conditions and geopolitical developments on the formation of adult education and training systems as well as their embeddedness in a nation’s education system are well known issues in the adult education community, particularly highlighted in comparative adult education research. Relatively new, though, is the idea that adult education is embedded in characteristic regimes of economic and social institutions, which can be understood in terms of a systematic and emerging political economy of adult learning systems (Rees 2013; Desjardins 2017). The origins of the term political economy can be traced back to Adam Smith, who is regarded as the father of political economy, and in the work of David Ricardo and Karl Marx. Today, the term has been adopted in various disciplines—from political and social science to psychology, education and environmental sciences—when studying the linkages and interactions between politics and economics and their influence on the formation and organisation of economic and social institutions. With the increasing scholarly interest from political scientists and economists on the study of education and training, a new research strand focusing on the interrelationships between politics and economics, i.e. the political economy of education and training, has been developed. The seminal work of Hall and Soskice (2001) on the Varieties of Capitalism (VoC) brought education and training to the frontline of comparative political economy research, as education and training was identified as one of the five institutional

/pdf/the-political-economy-of-adult-learning-systems-4w7rtafb58.pdf

The political economy of adult learning systems

This comparative study examines patterns of inequality in participation in two different types of adult learning and education (ALE) – job-related formal ALE (JFALE) and job-related non-formal ALE ...

Inequality in adult learning and education participation: the effects of social origins and social inequality

Inequality in adult learning and education (ALE) participation has been reported by previous comparative studies. In doing so, however, most of efforts have been made to understand such patterns of...

Conceptual Foundations for Understanding Inequality in Participation in Adult Learning and Education (ALE) for International Comparisons.

In conducting a literature review, this article explores changes to Adult Learning and Education (ALE) policies and related processes as well as the context within which those changes have taken pl...

Changes to Adult Learning and Education (ALE) Policy Environment in Finland, Korea and the United States: Implications for Addressing Inequality in ALE Participation.

Jeongwoo Lee

Papers

Inequality in adult learning and education participation: the effects of social origins and social inequality

Conceptual Foundations for Understanding Inequality in Participation in Adult Learning and Education (ALE) for International Comparisons.

Changes to Adult Learning and Education (ALE) Policy Environment in Finland, Korea and the United States: Implications for Addressing Inequality in ALE Participation.