Intergenerational Income Mobility around the World: A Meta-Analysis

Work in Progress

Abstract

Intergenerational income persistence estimates are sensitive to methodological choices, such as the number of years over which income is averaged, the age at which it is measured, or the set of variables used to predict parental income when it is unobserved. In most cases, data constraints prevent researchers from adopting best practices, limiting comparability across studies. This study systematically compiles national estimates of intergenerational persistence from the literature together with detailed information on their estimation settings. Cross-study variation in these parameters is used to provide a joint assessment of the impact of estimation settings on persistence estimates. Building on these results, national measures are adjusted for methodological differences to provide as consistent a depiction of the variation in intergenerational mobility across countries as possible.