Title

Mobility as Progressivity: Ranking Income Processes According to Equality of Opportunity

Author(s)

Roland Benabou Roland Benabou (Princeton University)

Efe A. Ok Efe Ok (New York University)

Abstract

Interest in economic mobility stems largely from its perceived role as an equalizer of opportunities, though not necessarily of outcomes. In this paper we show that this view leads very naturally to a methodology for the measurement of social mobility which has strong parallels with the theory of progressive taxation. We characterize opportunity?equalizing mobility processes, and provide simple criteria to determine when one process is more equalizing than another. We then explain how this mobility ordering relates to social welfare analysis, and how it di�ers from existing ones. We also extend standard indices of tax progressivity to mobility processes, and illustrate our general methodology on intra- and intergenerational mobility data from the United States and Italy.

Creation Date

2000-08

Section URL ID

WWSEcon

Paper Number

dp211.pdf

URL

https://www.princeton.edu/~rbenabou/papers/w8431.pdf

File Function

Jel

D31, D63, H20, J62

Keyword(s)

Social Mobility, Income Distribution, Inequality, Equality of Opportunity, Progressive Taxation

Suppress

false

Series

4