A study published last year by New York University highlighted the slow down in social mobility in the United States, as the American dream proves increasingly illusive. The data shows the the sons and daughters of high-status parents have many more advantages in the labor market than previous work believed. For instance, roughly 50% of children of workers in top tier occupations now work in occupations of a similar stature. Alternatively, half of the children of parents in bottom tier work also work in occupations of a similar stature.
A new study from Boston College highlights how rising economic inequality makes such social mobility even harder. The study reveals that rising economic inequality makes upward mobility feel practically impossible for disadvantaged youths, which in turn results in lower motivation and less productive behaviors.
It’s fairly well known that behaviors such as dropping out of school and early pregnancy are more common among disadvantaged youngsters in areas with high levels of inequality. It’s also fairly well known that inequality affects us psychologically, and can weaken our belief in socioeconomic opportunity, which in turn reduces the chances of us behaving in the right way.
The Boston research aimed to bring together the social sciences to gain a more holistic overview of how inequality affects our choices and behaviors, and subsequently the levels of social mobility.
“Economists, psychologists, and other social scientists have worked to understand how economic inequality influences the life outcomes of disadvantaged youth, but research in these disciplines has proceeded largely in parallel,” the authors say. “Integrating these separate lines of research, we find strong evidence that one way that economic inequality can contribute to negative outcomes for disadvantaged youth is by weakening the motivating belief that achieving socioeconomic success is possible for them.”
Boosting motivation
The authors suggest that such an integrated approach can have significant policy implications, as the very act of reducing economic inequality would boost the motivation of disadvantaged youngsters to better themselves. They believe that inequality could be improved via immediate interventions, especially if paired with mobility promoting opportunities, such as mentorship schemes.
“We are not implying that high-poverty students who avoid positive behavior do so simply because they have misguided beliefs about social mobility, and that all that is needed is to convince them otherwise,” the authors conclude. “People who believe that mobility is unrealistic likely hold those beliefs because society has not historically provided viable opportunities for or pathways to advancement. Interventions should entail real, systemic changes to educational, occupational and social environments that provide high-poverty youth with concrete and viable routes to future socioeconomic success and mobility in an increasingly unequal society.”
