Persistence, Privilege, and Parenting: The Comparative Study of Intergenerational Mobility

Americans like to believe that theirs is the land of opportunity, but the hard facts are that children born into poor families in the United States tend to stay poor and children born into wealthy families generally stay rich. Other countries have shown more success at lessening the effects of inequality on mobility-possibly by making public investments in education, health, and family well-being that offset the private advantages of the wealthy. What can the United States learn from these ...