Research Papers

We examine intergenerational educational and occupational mobility in China and Russia during their transitions from centrally planned to market economies. We focus on the extent new generations can escape institutional and structural constraints shaping their parents’ outcomes. We estimate overall and steady-state mobility and decompose it to reveal mechanisms driving intergenerational change.

Analysis of intergenerational mobility in China and Russia must account for the fact that observed mobility arises within an evolving dynamic system. We offer the first attempt to measure intergenerational mobility in these transition economies, isolating the transmission of educational and occupational status between parents and children from the direct effects of exogenous structural change.

We offer a novel perspective on intergenerational mobility in transition economies. Our measures address limits of traditional approaches that overstate mobility in contexts like China and Russia. By isolating transmission of social status from structural changes, this method allows more accurate assessments and enhances comparability of mobility across countries.