Book Chapter•
Income inequality and income mobility
01 Jan 2007-pp 2275-2277
About: The article was published on 2007-01-01 and is currently open access. It has received 114 citation(s) till now. The article focuses on the topic(s): Income distribution & Income inequality metrics.
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TL;DR: This article used Social Security Administration longitudinal earnings micro data since 1937 to analyze the evolution of inequality and mobility in the United States and found that long-term mobility among all workers has increased since the 1950s but has slightly declined among men.
Abstract: This paper uses Social Security Administration longitudinal earnings micro data since 1937 to analyze the evolution of inequality and mobility in the United States. Annual earnings inequality is U-shaped, decreasing sharply up to 1953 and increasing steadily afterward. Short-term earnings mobility measures are stable over the full period except for a temporary surge during World War II. Virtually all of the increase in the variance in annual (log) earnings since 1970 is due to increase in the variance of permanent earnings (as opposed to transitory earnings). Mobility at the top of the earnings distribution is stable and has not mitigated the dramatic increase in annual earnings concentration since the 1970s. Long-term mobility among all workers has increased since the 1950s but has slightly declined among men. The decrease in the gender earnings gap and the resulting substantial increase in upward mobility over a lifetime for women are the driving force behind the increase in long-term mobility among all workers.
482 citations
Cites background or methods from "Income inequality and income mobili..."
...The annual samples are selected based on a fixed subset of digits of the transformation of the Social Security Number....
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...Shorrocks (1978) shows that (Theorem 1a, p. XX): G(z̄) ≤ K∑ t=1 G(zt)/K, where zt is the vector of earnings in period t and z̄ the vector of average (across periods) earnings....
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...Therefore, conceptually, a way to measure mobility (Shorrocks, 1978) is to compare inequality of short-term earnings to inequality of long-term earnings and define mobility as: (1) Long-term earnings inequality = Short-term earning inequality * (1 - Mobility) Alternatively, one can define mobility…...
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors estimate trends in intergenerational economic mobility by matching men in the Census to synthetic parents in the prior generation, finding that mobility increased from 1950 to 1980 but has declined sharply since 1980.
Abstract: We estimate trends in intergenerational economic mobility by matching men in the Census to synthetic parents in the prior generation. We find that mobility increased from 1950 to 1980 but has declined sharply since 1980. While our estimator places greater weight on location effects than the standard intergenerational coefficient, the size of the bias appears to be small. Our preferred results suggest that earnings are regressing to the mean more slowly now than at any time since World War II, causing economic differences between families to become more persistent. However, current rates of positional mobility appear historically normal.
221 citations
TL;DR: Gender- and age-related changes in sexual orientation identity from early adolescence through emerging adulthood in 13,840 youth ages 12–25 employing mobility measure M, a measure modified from its original application for econometrics is described.
Abstract: This study investigated stability and change in self-reported sexual orientation identity over time in youth. We describe gender- and age-related changes in sexual orientation identity from early adolescence through emerging adulthood in 13,840 youth ages 12–25 employing mobility measure M, a measure we modified from its original application for econometrics. Using prospective data from a large, ongoing cohort of U.S. adolescents, we examined mobility in sexual orientation identity in youth with up to four waves of data. Ten percent of males and 20% of females at some point described themselves as a sexual minority, while 2% of both males and females reported ever being “unsure” of their orientation. Two novel findings emerged regarding gender and mobility: (1) Although mobility scores were quite low for the full cohort, females reported significantly higher mobility than did males. (2) As expected, for sexual minorities, mobility scores were appreciably higher than for the full cohort; however, the gender difference appeared to be eliminated, indicating that changing reported sexual orientation identity throughout adolescence occurred at a similar rate in female and male sexual minorities. In addition, we found that, of those who described themselves as “unsure” of their orientation identity at any point, 66% identified as completely heterosexual at other reports and never went on to describe themselves as a sexual minority. Age was positively associated with endorsing a sexual-minority orientation identity. We discuss substantive and methodological implications of our findings for understanding development of sexual orientation identity in young people.
163 citations
TL;DR: This article developed a new class of measures of mobility as an equalizer of longer-term incomes, a concept different from other notions such as mobility as time-independence, positional movement, share movement, income flux, and directional income movement.
Abstract: This paper develops a new class of measures of mobility as an equalizer of longer-term incomes—a concept different from other notions such as mobility as time-independence, positional movement, share movement, income flux, and directional income movement. A number of properties are specified leading to a class of indices, one easily-implementable member of which is applied to data for the USA and France. Using this index, income mobility is found to have equalized longer-term earnings among US men in the 1970s but not in the 1980s or 1990s. In France, though, income mobility was equalizing throughout, and it has attained its maximum in the most recent period.
141 citations
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01 Jan 2013
TL;DR: In this article, the authors survey the literature on income mobility, aiming to provide an integrated discussion of mobility within and between-generations, and review mobility concepts, descriptive devices, measurement methods, data sources, and recent empirical evidence.
Abstract: We survey the literature on income mobility, aiming to provide an integrated discussion of mobility within- and between-generations. We review mobility concepts, descriptive devices, measurement methods, data sources, and recent empirical evidence.
131 citations
Cites background or methods from "Income inequality and income mobili..."
...It has been found as an empirical regularity, from Shorrocks (1981) onwards, that using different indices can make a big difference to the estimates of R derived and also that the Gini coefficient tends to show greater R values than other inequality indices....
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...Evidence about sibling correlations in earnings (and income) was surveyed by Solon (1999), Björklund and Jäntti (2009), and also by Schnitzlein (2013), who provides new estimates for Denmark, Germany, and the USA....
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...The normalized trace is the Shorrocks (1978b) index calculated from the decile transition matrix....
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...The Equalization indices are those of Shorrocks (1978a) and Fields (2010)....
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...A more detailed examination of these two facets of mobility will provide a better understanding of the impact of income variability and the implications for social welfare (Shorrocks, 1978a, 392–393)....
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References
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TL;DR: This article used Social Security Administration longitudinal earnings micro data since 1937 to analyze the evolution of inequality and mobility in the United States and found that long-term mobility among all workers has increased since the 1950s but has slightly declined among men.
Abstract: This paper uses Social Security Administration longitudinal earnings micro data since 1937 to analyze the evolution of inequality and mobility in the United States. Annual earnings inequality is U-shaped, decreasing sharply up to 1953 and increasing steadily afterward. Short-term earnings mobility measures are stable over the full period except for a temporary surge during World War II. Virtually all of the increase in the variance in annual (log) earnings since 1970 is due to increase in the variance of permanent earnings (as opposed to transitory earnings). Mobility at the top of the earnings distribution is stable and has not mitigated the dramatic increase in annual earnings concentration since the 1970s. Long-term mobility among all workers has increased since the 1950s but has slightly declined among men. The decrease in the gender earnings gap and the resulting substantial increase in upward mobility over a lifetime for women are the driving force behind the increase in long-term mobility among all workers.
482 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors estimate trends in intergenerational economic mobility by matching men in the Census to synthetic parents in the prior generation, finding that mobility increased from 1950 to 1980 but has declined sharply since 1980.
Abstract: We estimate trends in intergenerational economic mobility by matching men in the Census to synthetic parents in the prior generation. We find that mobility increased from 1950 to 1980 but has declined sharply since 1980. While our estimator places greater weight on location effects than the standard intergenerational coefficient, the size of the bias appears to be small. Our preferred results suggest that earnings are regressing to the mean more slowly now than at any time since World War II, causing economic differences between families to become more persistent. However, current rates of positional mobility appear historically normal.
221 citations
TL;DR: Gender- and age-related changes in sexual orientation identity from early adolescence through emerging adulthood in 13,840 youth ages 12–25 employing mobility measure M, a measure modified from its original application for econometrics is described.
Abstract: This study investigated stability and change in self-reported sexual orientation identity over time in youth. We describe gender- and age-related changes in sexual orientation identity from early adolescence through emerging adulthood in 13,840 youth ages 12–25 employing mobility measure M, a measure we modified from its original application for econometrics. Using prospective data from a large, ongoing cohort of U.S. adolescents, we examined mobility in sexual orientation identity in youth with up to four waves of data. Ten percent of males and 20% of females at some point described themselves as a sexual minority, while 2% of both males and females reported ever being “unsure” of their orientation. Two novel findings emerged regarding gender and mobility: (1) Although mobility scores were quite low for the full cohort, females reported significantly higher mobility than did males. (2) As expected, for sexual minorities, mobility scores were appreciably higher than for the full cohort; however, the gender difference appeared to be eliminated, indicating that changing reported sexual orientation identity throughout adolescence occurred at a similar rate in female and male sexual minorities. In addition, we found that, of those who described themselves as “unsure” of their orientation identity at any point, 66% identified as completely heterosexual at other reports and never went on to describe themselves as a sexual minority. Age was positively associated with endorsing a sexual-minority orientation identity. We discuss substantive and methodological implications of our findings for understanding development of sexual orientation identity in young people.
163 citations
TL;DR: This article developed a new class of measures of mobility as an equalizer of longer-term incomes, a concept different from other notions such as mobility as time-independence, positional movement, share movement, income flux, and directional income movement.
Abstract: This paper develops a new class of measures of mobility as an equalizer of longer-term incomes—a concept different from other notions such as mobility as time-independence, positional movement, share movement, income flux, and directional income movement. A number of properties are specified leading to a class of indices, one easily-implementable member of which is applied to data for the USA and France. Using this index, income mobility is found to have equalized longer-term earnings among US men in the 1970s but not in the 1980s or 1990s. In France, though, income mobility was equalizing throughout, and it has attained its maximum in the most recent period.
141 citations
[...]
01 Jan 2013
TL;DR: In this article, the authors survey the literature on income mobility, aiming to provide an integrated discussion of mobility within and between-generations, and review mobility concepts, descriptive devices, measurement methods, data sources, and recent empirical evidence.
Abstract: We survey the literature on income mobility, aiming to provide an integrated discussion of mobility within- and between-generations. We review mobility concepts, descriptive devices, measurement methods, data sources, and recent empirical evidence.
131 citations