An Econometric Analysis of Intergenerational Reliance on Social Assistance

This paper examines the intergenerational transmission of participation in Québec's social assistance program. The analysis takes into account two sources of intergenerational transmission: one that is due to a causal link between parents' and children's participation and one that is due to a correlation between individual or environment-specific characteristics across generations. Our data come from the records of Québec's Ministère de la Solidarité Sociale and cover 17,203 young people who were 18 years old in 1990 and whose parents were recipients of social assistance during at least one month between 1979 and 1990. Our results reveal that, on average, a one-month increase in the parental participation during the youth's pre-adult years (age 7-17) raises the youth's participation by about 0.15 month during early adulthood (age 18-21). Moreover, this impact is stronger during the early stages of childhood (age 7-9) and late adolescence (age 16-17).