Underpinning our sense that society is a largely meritocratic affair is the notion that education can equalize any inequalities that may exist and allow the cream to rise to the surface.  Alas, new research from North Carolina State University suggests such notions may be somewhat removed from reality.

The research set out to explore the extent to which the social status of our parents gives us an advantage in life.  The researchers used the educational achievements of the parents as a proxy for their social status, before then looking at the earnings of their adult children as a proxy for their professional success.

The researchers looked at data from the National Survey of College Graduates between 2010 and 2017.  They were especially interested in adults between 35 and 67 years of age who had reported on both their income and the education of their parents.

A helping hand

The analysis showed that if a son gets a similar degree to that achieved by his parent then the son will earn more than if his parent didn’t achieve that level of education.  For instance, son A would earn more by being a doctor if his parents were also doctors than son B would if his parents only had bachelor’s degrees.  A similar phenomenon exists for daughters but to a lesser extent.

“The effect we see here essentially preserves social stratification for sons—less so for daughters,” the researchers say. “We like to think that if someone makes it to college, becomes a lawyer, becomes a doctor, they have ‘made it.’ But what we see is that even earning an advanced degree is unlikely to put you on the same professional footing as someone who earned the same degree but started higher on the social ladder.”

The researchers believe that their results show that while education is clearly important, it’s not enough in and of itself to overcome the challenges society faces in terms of inequality.

“This work shows that social origin matters, but it’s not clear what drives this structural inequality,” the researchers conclude. “Is it social capital? Access to networks? Differing financial resources? Is parental background becoming more important as a larger percentage of the population is getting a college degree? Is the advantage at the beginning of a child’s career? There is still a lot of room for additional research on this subject.”