Economic opportunities
Our key finding is that economic opportunities measured by literacy rates have improved over time. In Africa, children of both sexes born in the mid-1990s to illiterate parents had a 60 percent likelihood of completing primary school. In comparison, those born in the mid-1940s had only a 20 percent probability. On the other hand, four out of five children whose parents work in one of the traditional low-skill agricultural sectors are likely to follow in their parents’ footsteps across gender and all birth cohorts. This finding suggests that increased education has not translated into better jobs for everyone, which underscores the general African youth unemployment problem. Several factors could explain this divergence, including market and policy failures, the absence of labor opportunities, and school quality.
Moreover, there is staggering heterogeneity in African countries’ rates of economic opportunity. In Botswana and South Africa, 75 percent of children achieve higher literacy status than their uneducated parents, whereas that figure is less than 20 percent in Ethiopia and Mozambique. In occupational status, half of the children born in Botswana and South Africa surpass that of their farmer parents. In Ethiopia and Mozambique, only a handful of them end up in a higher-status profession. These findings reflect the persistence of poverty and lack of opportunity in many African countries. Disaggregating the data by gender and region shows that children born in rural areas have a significantly lower probability of upward mobility in education and occupation status than their peers born in urban areas. In addition, in many African countries, there is a conspicuous gender wedge that appears to narrow over generations.
Looking at the interplay between education and occupation, the joint upward mobility in education and occupation has declined over younger cohorts, suggesting that the occupational reward, or premium, from better education is declining over time. This disconnect between educational and occupational mobility in recent decades could be linked to two factors: more graduates but weak job creation and a mismatch between labor market needs and graduates’ skills. More surprisingly, the probability that a child with upgraded educational attainment will experience downward mobility in occupation has increased over time.
To get further insight into the factors associated with social mobility, we examined several possible drivers of intergenerational mobility in education and occupation. Our research shows that higher upward intergenerational mobility is positively associated with access to electricity and water. Other mechanisms—such as higher fertility, rural residence, and child marriage—are negatively associated with upward mobility. Differences in mobility across countries could also reflect disparities in public education spending, institutions’ quality, and social protection coverage. Other factors, such as conflicts and natural resource endowment are negatively associated with upward educational and occupational mobility.
