Empirical findings suggest a positive correlation between inequality and social immobility, a phenomenon coined the Gatsby curve. However, complete explanations of the phenomenon have not yet been proposed. This paper answers two questions: What are Gatsby curves? When do they exist? We build a...

This paper uses Census microdata linked with tax records to quantify the contribution of career choices - occupations and fields of study - to intergenerational income mobility. We document substantial segregation into occupations by parental income. Yet, the occupations children pursue explain...

Intergenerational mobility has decreased over time for the cohorts of children born between the 1960s and the 1980s in Canada. At the same time, returns to education have gone up. Both factors have contributed to exacerbating income gaps between children of parents with and without secondary...

While cross-sectional increases in inequality are a cause for concern, the study of the intergenerational transmission of socioeconomic status is perhaps more relevant. How is social status reproduced from one generation to the next? Recent work has highlighted the relationship, if not causal...

This paper uses Census microdata linked with tax records to quantify the contribution of career choices - occupations and fields of study - to intergenerational income mobility. We document substantial segregation into occupations by parental income. Yet, the occupations children pursue explain...

In this paper, we exploit intergenerationally-linked tax files and Census data to first document the intergenerational income transmission between individuals who immigrated to Canada as children-the 1.5 generation-and their parents. We find that the correlation between parental income rank and...