Destination as a process: Sibling similarity in early socioeconomic trajectories

(2019) - Aleksi Karhula, Jani Erola, Marcel Raab, Anette Fasang

Journal: Advances in Life Course Research
Link:: https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1040260818301473
DOI:: 10.1016/j.alcr.2019.04.015
Links::
Tags:: #paper #Transition #school-to-work
Cite Key:: [@karhulaDestinationProcessSibling2019]

Abstract

This paper proposes a process-oriented life course perspective on intergenerational mobility by comparing the early socioeconomic trajectories of siblings to those of unrelated persons. Based on rich Finnish register data (N = 21,744), the findings show that social origin affects not only final outcomes at given points in the life course but also longitudinal socioeconomic trajectories from ages 17–35 in early adulthood. We contribute to previous literature in three ways. First, we show that there is a pronounced similarity in the early socioeconomic trajectories of siblings. This similarity is stronger for same-sex siblings and stronger for brothers than for sisters. Second, we show that sibling similarity in full trajectories cannot be reduced to similarity in outcomes, i.e., siblings are not only more similar in the final outcomes that they obtain but also in the pathways that lead them to these outcomes. Third, our findings support that sibling similarity follows a U-shaped pattern by social class, i.e., similarity is especially strong in disadvantaged trajectories, weak among middle-class young adults, and increases again within the most advantaged trajectories. We conclude that measures of social mobility that concentrate on final outcomes are at risk of underestimating the association between social origin and destination because social inequalities are formed across the life course, not just at the end of specific life phases.

Notes

"dings show that social origin affects not only final outcomes at given points in the life course but also longitudinal socioeconomic trajectories from ages 17-35 in early adulthood. W" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"weshowthatthereisapronouncedsimilarityintheearlysocioeconomic trajectories ofsiblings" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"ond, we show that sibling similarity in full trajectories cannot be reduced to similarity in outcomes, i.e., siblingsarenotonlymoresimilarinthefinaloutcomesthattheyobtainbutalsointhepathwaysthatleadthem to these outcom" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"elying on "final" outcomes, however, has a notable drawback: it ignores how family background determines longitudinal trajectories of sequentially linked education and employment states leading to these outcomes" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"Third, our findings support that sibling similarity follows a U-shaped pattern by social class" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"his paper builds on the life course paradigm and Abbott (2016) in emphasizing the need for "process outcomes" of social in" (Karhula et al 2019:85)

"First, we extend previous findings from "final" outcome regression analysis by applying dyadic sequence analysis to study sibling similarity in early socio-," (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"Second,weassesstheaddedvalueoftheprocessoutcomeapproach by comparing our results to those of a final outcomes analysis." (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"Finally, we show that sibling similarity in ESETs is particularly strong among siblings from the most disadvantaged and most ad-" (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"Overall, the strongest intergenerational correlations in socioGlauber, 2008; Hauser & Mossel, 1985). Several studies show that the transmission of occupational status and income is in part mediated by education, but they also observe independent effects of parental status on the children's socioeconomic outcomes (Bukodi, Erikson, & Goldthorpe, 2014; Erola, Jalonen, & Lehti, 2016)." (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"Several recent studies have applied sequence analysis to describe school-to-work transitions and early employment trajectories (e.g., Brzinsky-Fay, 2007; Lorentzen, Bäckman, Ilmakunnas, & Kauppinen, 2018; Pollock, 2007)." (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"Based on theoretical consideration and previous research, we disdifferent stages of the life course: 1) parental education, 2) parental economic resources, 3) parental unemployment, 4) family structure" (Karhula et al 2019:86)

"duringchildhood,5)regionalcharacteristicssharedbyallmembersofa household, e.g., local labor market opportunities, and 6) genetic simi-e" (Karhula et al 2019:87)

"nally, based on previous findings, one can assume that part of the origin effect on ESETs is gender specific" (Karhula et al 2019:87)

"blingdesignsare wellestablishedin thestratificationliteratureas an efficient method for estimating the impact of social origin on so-; Solon, 1992)" (Karhula et al 2019:88)

"analysis, on the other hand, is particularly useful to study trajectories of categorical states that indicate status at--t" (Karhula et al 2019:88)

"We apply optimal matching—the most common form of sequence analysis in the social sciences—which calculates pairwise distances betweenallsequencesbyusingtwotransformationoperations,namely, substitution and insertion/deletion of states, to turn one sequence into another" (Karhula et al 2019:90)

"verall, the findings indicate that observed characteristics of the family background—parental education, income during childhood, parental unemployment, parental divorce and separation, and re-t" (Karhula et al 2019:94)

"irst, although registers provide exceptionally reliable information on social origin, we could not measure everything shared in the sib-e" (Karhula et al 2019:95)

"econd, genetically informed research on twins (Heath et al., 1985; Kohler, Rodgers, & Christensen, 1999) argues that high sibling (twin) similarity might arise in open meritocratic societies because the gean open opportunity structure." (Karhula et al 2019:95)

"In a similar vein, we want to highlight another seemingly counternecessarily point to weak social origin effects. This is a well-known methodological and substantive issue that our analysis shares with traditional sibling resemblance models that use single outcome mea-," (Karhula et al 2019:95)

"Sibling similarity was most pronounced for disadvantaged trajecthe labor force for other reasons, followed by the similarity in trajeceducation. T" (Karhula et al 2019:95)