@Jonsson2009

(2009) - Jan O. Jonsson, David B. Grusky, Matthew Di Carlo, Reinhard Pollak, Mary C. Brinton

Journal: American Journal of Sociology
Link:: http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/596566
DOI:: 10.1086/596566
Links::
Tags:: #paper #SocialClass
Cite Key:: [@Jonsson2009]

Abstract

In the sociological literature on social mobility, the long-standing convention has been to assume that intergenerational reproduction takes one of two forms: a categorical form that has parents passing on a big-class position to their children or a gradational form that has parents passing on their socioeconomic standing. These approaches ignore in their own ways the important role that occupations play in transferring opportunities from one generation to the next. In new analyses of nationally representative data from the United States, Sweden, Germany, and Japan, the authors show that (a) occupations are an important conduit for social reproduction, (b) the most extreme rigidities in the mobility regime are only revealed when analyses are carried out at the occupational level, and (c) much of what shows up as big-class reproduction in conventional mobility analyses is in fact occupational reproduction in disguise.

Notes

“These approaches ignore in their own ways the important role that occupations play in transferring opportunities from one generation to the next.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 977)

“(a) occupations are an important conduit for social reproduction, (b) the most extreme rigidities in the mobility regime are only revealed when analyses are carried out at the occupational level, and (c) much of what shows up as big-class reproduction in conventional mobility analyses is in fact occupational reproduction in disguise.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 977)

“Throughout this review, we will often refer to occupations as microclasses, as they embody mechanisms (e.g., closure) and traits (e.g., culture) that are often attributed to big classes.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 979)

“The microclass approach shares with the big-class model the presumption that contemporary labor markets are balkanized into discrete categories, but such balkanization is assumed to take principally the form of institutionalized occupations” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 982)

“rather than institutionalized big classes (e.g., routine nonmanuals, proprietors).” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 983)

“Instead, we expect that the relative strength of big-class or microclass reproduction in any given society will be affected by the prevailing mix of institutional forms, some supporting big-class structuration (e.g., trade unions) and others supporting microclass struc-” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 983)

“turation (e.g., state-supported occupational closure).” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 984)

“Goldthorpe (2007, p. 144), that “a reliance on occupationally specific factors, which are likely themselves to be quite variable over time and space, would seem especially inadequate” in explaining class reproduction” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 984)

“occupations were described as the “backbone” of the inequality system (e.g., Parkin 1971),” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 984)

“Because professional children come into frequent contact with other professional families, they will (a) learn about the world of professions and come to be oriented toward that world, (b) develop knowledge about how to prepare for professional occupations, and (c) have a ready supply of contacts who can assist them as they begin their careers” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 987)

“a purely economic mechanism does not tell us why professional children might aspire to become professionals, but it does speak to why, once such aspirations are in place, they are especially likely to be realized.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 987)

“The two-pronged foundation of all cultures is (1) a training regimen that inculcates a set of values and way of life and (2) some type of closure mechanism that ensures that class or occupation members interact principally with one another and thus protects against extraneous influences that could undermine the shared values into which members have been trained.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 988)

“As Grusky (2005) stresses, not all occupations have well-developed training regimens and dense intraoccupational networks of this sort, but those that do will develop an “esprit de corps” that can then be passed on to children and contribute to microclass reproduction (e.g., Caplow 1954; Hughes 1958; Van Maanen and Barley 1984).” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 989)

“As Goldthorpe (1987, p. 99) put it, one might expect “particularistic variations” in the perceived desirability of different positions, variations that stem in part from culturally specific judgments about what types of tasks are honorable, desirable, or valuable.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 989)

“when a teacher’s daughter cathects to her mother, it leads to a commitment to become a “teacher like Mom,” not necessarily a commitment to become a “middle-class worker like Mom.”” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 989)

“It is of course possible that such liquid resources will also be harnessed for the purpose of microclass reproduction: the same doctor might use her or his wealth to finance a child’s medical school training rather than law school training” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 990)

“fixed resources often come in occupation-specific form (e.g., the family dentistry practice) and will therefore facilitate occupation-specific reproduction disproportionately.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 990)

“In all countries, parents accumulate much occupation-specific capital, identify with their occupation, and accordingly “bring home” their occupation in ways, both direct and indirect, that then make it salient to their children and lead their children to invest in it.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 1022)

“These supply-side mechanisms, while likely to be important, may be supplemented by additional demand-side mechanisms. Most notably, employers or training institutions (e.g., professional schools) may sometimes discriminate in favor of workers or students who have parents in their chosen trade or profession, either because such family involvement is presumed to signal underlying skills (statistical discrimination) or because family networks are directly deployed to garner favor or privilege (pure discrimination).” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 1022)

“We have shown, finally, that the microclass form is surprisingly strong in the father-by-daughter mobility table. This result is striking because sex segregation might be presumed to undermine most cross-gender reproduction at the microclass level. We have found, again contrary to such conventional wisdom, that the forces of microclass reproduction remain strong even though sex segregation is so substantial. The daughter of a lawyer, for example, has a propensity to become a lawyer herself that is just slightly lower (by about 25%) than the corresponding propensity for a lawyer’s son.” (Jonsson et al., 2009, p. 1023)