Generations of Advantage. Multigenerational Correlations in Family Wealth.

ABSTRACT: Inequality in family wealth is high, yet we know little about how much and how wealth inequality is maintained across generations. We argue that a long-term perspective reflective of wealth's cumulative nature is crucial to understand the extent and channels of wealth reproduction across generations. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics that span nearly half a century, we show that a one-decile increase in parents' wealth position is associated with an increase of about four percentiles in their offspring's wealth position in adulthood. We show that grandparental wealth is a unique predictor of grandchildren's wealth, above and beyond the role of parental wealth, suggesting that a focus on only parent-child dyads understates the importance of family wealth lineages. Second, c

SUBMITTER: Pfeffer FT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6296851 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature