This paper shows that inequality in a crucial dimension of human capital – socio-emotional skills at age five – increased dramatically between two cohorts of British children born in 1970 and 2000. The authors used data from the British Cohort Study and the Millennium Cohort Study, which followed two cohorts of children born in 1970 … Read more
Inequality of socio-emotional skills: a cross-cohort comparison
COVID‐19 and Inequalities
This paper brings together evidence from various data sources and the most recent studies to describe what we know so far about the impacts of the COVID‐19 crisis on inequalities across several key domains of life, including employment and ability to earn, family life and health. We show how these new fissures interact with existing … Read more
The Challenges for Labour Market Policy during the COVID‐19 Pandemic
The COVID‐19 pandemic is having a dramatic economic impact in most countries. In the UK, it has led to sharp falls in labour demand in many sectors of the economy and to initial acute labour shortages in other sectors. Much more than in a typical downturn, the current crisis is not simply a general slowdown … Read more
Sources of change in the primary and secondary effects of social class origin on educational decisions: evidence from Denmark, 2002–2016
It is well-known that pupils from poorer backgrounds are more likely than their peers to take vocational rather than academic routes in upper secondary school – but what drives this? Does social class status itself lead to these decisions, or is there a mediating factor at play: that pupils from less well-off homes tend to … Read more
Heterogeneity in unemployment dynamics: (Un)observed drivers of the longitudinal accumulation of risks
We know those in unemployment are at increased risk of being unemployed again, but is this a causal relationship between past and future risks? This paper, based on large-scale data from four European countries, answer to this question disentangling the effect of past unemployment from the effect of other factors which may also be at … Read more
Students’ behavioural responses to a fallback option – Evidence from introducing interim degrees in German schools
This paper examines the outcome of a policy-change in Germany which was designed to ensure students who dropped out at a late stage still had an interim qualification. It finds the reform reduced the number who downgraded to lower-level educational tracks and also increased the number successfully completing higher-level tracks. The research uses data collected … Read more
Application of the EU-SILC 2011 data module “intergenerational transmission of disadvantage” to robust analysis of inequality of opportunity
This data article describes the original data, the sample selection process and the variables used in Andreoli and Fusco (Andreoli and Fusco, 2019) to estimate gap curves for a sample of European countries. Raw data are from 2011 roaster of EU-SILC, cross-sectional sample of module “intergenerational transmission of disadvantage”. This article reports descriptive statistics of … Read more
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and Earnings in Later-Life Self-Employment
It has been suggested that individuals with ADHD are likely to go into self-employment, where a flair for entrepreneurship may improve their prospects. But this study suggests the choice of self-employment may not always be a positive one for those with this condition. This paper asks two questions: Are those with a genetic predisposition to … Read more
ADHD and later-life labor market outcomes in the United States
People at genetic risk of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) suffer negative effects on their employment, individual income and household wealth. But these can probably be mitigated by higher educational attainment, this paper finds. The researchers looked at a sample of approximately 9,000 individuals aged 50-65 who took part in the American Health and Retirement … Read more
Effect of Genetic Propensity for Obesity on Income and Wealth Through Educational Attainment
This paper shows that a genetic propensity to obesity affects women more than men in the labour market. The research draws on a representative sample of almost 6,000 Americans aged 50-65 and not yet retired from the US Health and Retirement Study. It looks at factors such as individual income, household wealth, health and retirement … Read more