An article examined developments in the mechanisms for realizing policy on education and social mobility over the previous ten years. Despite similarities in the process of policy formation before and after the General Election of 2010, the changing nature of the policy levers chosen by the coalition government represented a move from a rationalist, directing state towards a more hybrid but nevertheless neo-liberal model. The government still intended to 'steer' the education system through data: but in a more developed market system with little supervision, its effects would be less predictable.
Source: Richard Riddell, 'Changing policy levers under the neoliberal state: realising coalition policy on education and social mobility', Journal of Education Policy, Volume 28 Number 6
Links: Abstract
>Date: 2013-Dec
A think-tank report examined the system of appointments to public bodies. It said that, in broad terms, the public appointments system was working satisfactorily. However, the report said that the existing measure of diversity (based around gender, ethnicity and disability) was too narrow and ignored aspects such as occupational and socio-economic diversity. It called for the scope of monitoring to be expanded, for an inquiry into special initiatives to encourage more people from 'routine and manual' occupations into public appointments, and for examination of the selection process.
Source: Michael Pinto-Duschinsky and Lynne Middleton, Reforming Public Appointments, Policy Exchange
Links: Report | Policy Exchange press release
Date: 2013-Dec
A special issue of a journal examined education and social mobility.
Source: British Journal of Sociology of Education, Volume 34 Issue 5-6
Links: Table of contents
Notes: Articles included:
A.H. Halsey, 'Reflections on education and social mobility'
Fiona Devine and Yaojun Li, 'The changing relationship between origins, education and destinations in the 1990s and 2000s'
Carol Vincent, Stephen Ball, Nicola Rollock, and David Gillborn, 'Three generations of racism: Black middle-class children and schooling'
Date: 2013-Dec
A report examined the consequences for the European Union of global social trends. It identified relevant trends that included: a new global middle class; population growth and ageing; employment and the labour market; and migration. It said many trends were uncertain and would be influenced by external factors. It outlined how the analysis could inform the ongoing work of the European Union.
Source: Stijn Hoorens, Jeremy Ghez, Benoit Guerin, Daniel Schweppenstedde, Tess Hellgren, Veronika Horvath, Marlon Graf, Barbara Janta, Sam Drabble, and Svitlana Kobzar, Europe s Societal Challenges: An analysis of global societal trends to 2030 and their impact on the EU, RAND Corporation
Links: Report | Summary | Rand press release
Date: 2013-Dec
A paper examined the literature on income mobility within- and between-generations. The paper discussed mobility concepts, descriptive devices, measurement methods, data sources, and recent empirical evidence. It said there had been substantial progress in the analysis of income mobility, assisted by the availability of appropriate longitudinal data. Many substantive issues of interest remained unresolved, including: the trajectory of within-generation mobility; income mobility between generations; measures of individual income growth and income risk; patterns of variation over calendar time and age; and household income dynamics.
Source: Markus Jantti and Stephen Jenkins, Income Mobility, Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex
Date: 2013-Nov
A study examined the economic activity and skills levels of households with different incomes, in order to identify the links between poverty, economic status and skills.
Source: Matt Barnes and Chris Lord, Poverty, Economic Status and Skills: What are the links?, Joseph Rowntree Foundation
Links: Report | Summary | JRF press release
Date: 2013-Nov
A commission issued a report on social mobility and on progress against the government's child poverty targets.
Source: State of the Nation 2013: Social mobility and child poverty in Great Britain, Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission
Links: Report | BBC report | Guardian report | Telegraph report | Independent report | CPAG press release | NAVCA press release
Date: 2013-Oct
A report by a government-appointed commission examined what the business sector could do to improve social mobility, and what they might gain from it. There were 'serious barriers' to mobility, and businesses sometimes contributed to these barriers. The report called on employers and government now to act through refreshing the government's 'social mobility business compact'.
Source: , Business and Social Mobility: A manifesto for change, Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission
Links: Report | Commission press release
Date: 2013-Oct
A report (by an official advisory body) said that if the government were to make headway on tackling stagnating levels of social mobility, its top priorities should be to improve opportunities for low-paid workers to move up the career ladder, for young people to move from school to employment, and for disadvantaged youngsters to get support in their earliest years.
Source: Social Mobility: The Next Steps, Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission
Links: Report | Summary | EIF press release | Guardian report | Nursery World report
Date: 2013-Sep
A special issue of a journal examined the relationship between education and social mobility.
Source: British Journal of Sociology of Education, Volume 34 Issue 5-6
Links: Table of contents
Notes: Articles included:
Phillip Brown, 'Education, opportunity and the prospects for social mobility'
Ann-Marie Bathmaker, Nicola Ingram, and Richard Waller, 'Higher education, social class and the mobilisation of capitals: recognising and playing the game'
Fiona Devine and Yaojun Li, 'The changing relationship between origins, education and destinations in the 1990s and 2000s'
Anna Mountford-Zimdars, Steven Jones, Alice Sullivan, and Anthony Heath, 'Framing higher education: questions and responses in the British Social Attitudes survey, 1983-2010'
Carol Vincent, Stephen Ball, Nicola Rollock, and David Gillborn, 'Three generations of racism: Black middle-class children and schooling'
Date: 2013-Sep
A paper examined the divergence between two findings: that family income was more closely related to sons' earnings for a cohort born in 1970 compared with one born in 1958; and that, on the basis of social class, inter-generational mobility for this outcome was unchanged. Evidence was found of an increase in the inter-generational persistence of the permanent component of income that was unrelated to social class. The paper rejected the hypothesis that the observed decline in income mobility was a consequence of the poor measurement of permanent family income in the 1958 cohort.
Source: Jo Blanden, Paul Gregg, and Lindsey Macmillan, Intergenerational Persistence in Income and Social Class: The impact of within-group inequality, DP1242, Centre for Economic Performance (London School of Economics)
Links: Paper
Date: 2013-Sep
A paper examined how inter-generational income mobility in developed countries responded to structural changes in a simple theoretical model of inter-generational transmission, deviating from the existing literature by explicitly analyzing the transition path between steady states. It was found that mobility depended not only on existing but also on past transmission mechanisms, such that changing policies, institutions, or economic conditions might generate long-lasting trends. Declining mobility might not reflect a recent deterioration of equality of opportunity but rather major improvements made in the past.
Source: Martin Nybom and Jan Stuhler, Interpreting Trends in Intergenerational Income Mobility, Discussion Paper 7514, Institute for the Study of Labor (Bonn)
Links: Paper
Date: 2013-Aug
An article examined the links between family background and offspring achievements (education, labour market achievements, and earnings) in eight European Union countries – Germany, France, Spain, Italy, United Kingdom, Ireland, Denmark, and Finland. In all the countries, the association between family background and education was positive, strong, and significant: but for other outcomes the associations were more variable.
Source: Maurizio Franzini, Michele Raitano, and Francesco Vona, 'The channels of intergenerational transmission of inequality: a cross-country comparison', Rivista Italiana degli Economisti, Volume 18 Issue 2
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-Aug
An article examined patterns of social mobility over three generations of family members. The odds of grandchildren entering the professional-managerial class rather than the unskilled manual class were at least 2 times better if the grandparents were themselves in professional-managerial rather than unskilled manual-class positions. This 'grandparents effect' in social mobility persisted even when parents' education, income, and wealth were taken into account.
Source: Tak Wing Chan and Vikki Boliver, 'The grandparents effect in social mobility: evidence from British birth cohort studies', American Sociological Review, Volume 78 Number 4
Links: Abstract | Durham University press release | Oxford University press release | BBC report | Daily Mail report
Date: 2013-Jul
An article examined the way in which social capital resources were incorporated, appropriated, and distributed by different social classes in Europe.
Source: Renato Miguel Carmo and Nuno Nunes, 'Class and social capital in Europe: a transnational analysis of the European Social Survey', European Societies, Volume 15 Issue 3
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-Jun
A paper examined the theoretical basis of research into inter-generational social mobility and its mediation via education. It said that sociologists could usefully draw on theories originating in the economics of labour markets and, in particular, three theories in some degree deviating from mainstream human capital theory: screening and signalling theory; job competition theory; and incentive-enhancing preference theory.
Source: John Goldthorpe, The Role of Education in Intergenerational Social Mobility: Problems from empirical research in sociology and some theoretical pointers from economics, Barnett Papers in Social Research 13/02, Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford
Links: Paper
Date: 2013-Jun
An article said that the finding by some economists that social mobility had been declining was open to question; and that their failure to make an explicit distinction between absolute and relative rates of mobility had caused confusion. An alternative approach indicated that the only recent change of note had been that the rising rates of upward, absolute mobility of the middle decades of the previous century had levelled out. Relative rates had remained more or less constant back to the inter-war years. According to this alternative view, what could be achieved through education, whether in regard to absolute or relative mobility, appeared limited.
Source: John Goldthorpe, 'Understanding – and misunderstanding – social mobility in Britain: the entry of the economists, the confusion of politicians and the limits of educational policy', Journal of Social Policy, Volume 42 Issue 3
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-May
An article examined class divisions using survey data. It proposed a seven-class model, including a 'precariat' characterized by very low levels of social, cultural, and economic capital.
Source: Mike Savage, Fiona Devine, Niall Cunningham, Mark Taylor, Yaojun Li, Johs Hjellbrekke, Brigitte Le Roux, Sam Friedman, and Andrew Miles, 'A new model of social class: findings from the BBC s Great British Class Survey experiment', Sociology, 47 Issue 2
Links: Abstract | City University press release | Daily Mail report | Guardian report
Date: 2013-Apr
A paper examined how intergenerational mobility affected subjective well-being, using the British Cohort Study. Relative income mobility was found to be a significant predictor of life satisfaction and mental health, whether people moved up or down. For absolute income, mobility was only a predictor of well-being and mental health outcomes if the person moved down. Much of the effect of income mobility on well-being was due to changes in the perception of financial security: but those who slid down were still less satisfied with their lives over and above any effect of financial insecurity. The losses of sliding down were larger than the gains of moving up.
Source: Paul Dolan and Grace Lordan, Moving Up and Sliding Down: An empirical assessment of the effect of social mobility on subjective wellbeing, DP1190, Centre for Economic Performance (London School of Economics)
Links: Paper
Date: 2013-Feb
An article examined a special module on inter-generational transmission of poverty in the European Union Statistics of Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) 2005 wave. Information relating to parental background and childhood circumstances was collected for all household members aged over 24 and less than 66 at the end of the income reference period. The authors used the data to compare findings from one-dimensional and multi-dimensional approaches to poverty and social exclusion, in order to provide an assessment of the extent to which welfare regime variation provided a coherent account of the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage.
Source: Christopher Whelan, Brian Nolan, and Bertrand Maitre, 'Analysing intergenerational influences on income poverty and economic vulnerability with EU-SILC', European Societies, Volume 15 Issue 1
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-Feb
A new book examined the factors influencing social mobility, and policies that might be put in place to facilitate it – in particular those concerning welfare services, childcare, the education system, career structures, and labour market services. A more cohesive society was one where people were not divided on socio-economic or other grounds, citizens accepted that the division of rewards was fair, and everyone had equal starting points in life.
Source: Alex Nunn, Fostering Social Mobility as a Contribution to Social Cohesion, Council of Europe
Links: Summary
Date: 2013-Jan
An article examined why family income was more closely related to sons' earnings for a cohort born in 1970 compared with a cohort born in 1958 – in stark contrast with the fact that, on the basis of social class, intergenerational mobility was unchanged. There was evidence of an increase in the intergenerational persistence of the permanent component of income that was unrelated to social class. The authors rejected the hypothesis that the observed decline in income mobility was a consequence of the poor measurement of permanent family income in the 1958 cohort.
Source: Jo Blanden, Paul Gregg, and Lindsey Macmillan, 'Intergenerational persistence in income and social class: the effect of within-group inequality', Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series A, Volume 176 Issue 2
Links: Article
Date: 2013-Jan
An article examined the impact in Europe of social class (of origin) on a relevant selection of risks: unemployment, ill-health, living in a jobless household, single parenthood, and low-paid employment. There was 'clear evidence' of a substantial influence of social class. Social investment strategies needed to take stock of the persistence of traditional stratification cleavages – otherwise, a one-sided approach might create new forms of exclusion.
Source: Olivier Pintelon, Bea Cantillon, Karel Van den Bosch, and Christopher Whelan, 'The social stratification of social risks: the relevance of class for social investment strategies', Journal of European Social Policy, Volume 23 Number 1
Links: Abstract
See also: Olivier Pintelon, Bea Cantillon, Karel Van den Bosch, and Christopher Whelan, The Social Stratification of Social Risks, Working Paper 11/04, Herman Deleeck Centre for Social Policy (University of Antwerp)
Date: 2013-Jan
An article examined the hypothesis that the relationship between social class and quality of life in older people was due to the influence of social class on the perception that individuals had about their place in a social hierarchy. Even among those in employment, a subjective measure of social status explained quality of life better than the National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification. This effect was independent of advantageous occupational conditions, favourable life circumstances, or mental health.
Source: Gopalakrishnan Netuveli and Mel Bartley, 'Perception is reality: effect of subjective versus objective socio-economic position on quality of life', Sociology, Volume 46 Issue 6
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-Jan
An article examined the influences of social expenditures and social services on financial support and practical help from older parents to their adult children in Europe. It was found that social policy played an important role in intergenerational transfer patterns. The more public assistance was provided to citizens, the more likely it was that parents supported their adult children financially and practically.
Source: Martina Brandt and Christian Deindl, 'Intergenerational transfers to adult children in Europe: do social policies matter?', Journal of Marriage and Family, Volume 75 Issue 1
Links: Abstract
Date: 2013-Jan
A paper examined the extent to which educational systems fostered or constrained social mobility in European countries. Increasing rates of social mobility were found: but the erosion of the education-occupation linkage presented a threat to this trend. Considering formal credentials only, the most equalitarian educational systems were to be found in the United Kingdom and Ireland: but their ability to allocate individuals in the occupational structure was lower than in the other countries.
Source: Pedro Abrantes and Manuel Abrantes, What is the Impact of Educational Systems on Social Mobility across Europe? A comparative approach, Working Paper 1/2012, Socio-Economics Research Centre at the School of Economics and Management (Technical University of Lisbon)
Links: Paper
Date: 2013-Jan