Who's your daddy? : intergenerational mobility in the U.S. financial industry

This paper investigates the intergenerational mobility with regard to people's decision to work in the U.S. financial industry over the last 47 years. I present evidence that children of fathers who worked in the financial industry during their childhood are about 8 percentage points more likely to work in finance themselves. This increase in likelihood is greater than in most other industries and is driven solely by wealthier families. In addition, I document that second-generation finance industry employees whose fathers already worked in finance enjoy a substantial income surplus compared to their industry peers.