A new analysis of large-sample surveys in five comparable Sub-Saharan African countries allows measuring for the first time inequality of opportunity in Africa, aside inequality of resources and of living standards. We confirm the prevalence of high levels of inequality among the region’s...

We examine the association of income variability both within and across generations based on a heterogeneous growth model of permanent and transitory income in Sweden. Non-parametric regressions reveal that income variability is strongly associated with long-run levels of income, especially for...

Ce papier analyse, pour la première fois en Afrique, les inégalités de chance en termes de revenu. Cinq pays sont étudiés, à savoir la Côte d’Ivoire, le Ghana, la Guinée, Madagascar et l’Ouganda à partir d’enquêtes représentatives au niveau national contenant des informations...

Families, labor markets, and public policies all structure a child’s opportunities and determine the extent to which adult earnings are related to family background. Cross-country comparisons and the underlying trends suggest that these drivers will most likely lower the degree of...

This paper examines for the first time inequality of opportunity for income in Africa, by analyzing large-sample surveys, all providing information on individuals' parental background, in five comparable Sub-Saharan countries: Ivory Coast, Ghana, Guinea, Madagascar and Uganda. We compute...

The literature on intergenerational income mobility uses a diverse set of measures and there is limited knowledge about whether these measures provide similar information and yield similar conclusions. We provide a framework to highlight the key concepts and properties of the different...

A strong association between incomes across generations - with children from poor families likely to be poor as adults - is frequently considered an indicator of insufficient equality of opportunity. Studies of such "intergenerational persistence," or lack of intergenerational mobility, are...

This paper provides a novel theory that simultaneously explains the Great Gatsby curve and the Easterlin paradox, demonstrating that these two phenomena could be driven by the same mechanism. I model positional competition, in which production opportunities are allocated according to relative...

Among economists, empirical analysis of social mobility and the role of parental background is largely carried out in two separate strands of research. The intergenerational mobility literature estimates parent-child persistence in a certain outcome of interest, such as income. In contrast, the...

Among economists, empirical analysis of social mobility and the role of parental background is largely carried out in two separate strands of research. The intergenerational mobility literature estimates parent-child persistence in a certain outcome of interest, such as income. In contrast, the...