A Natural Experiment on Social Mobility: East and West Germany after Reunification

• In Event: 251 - Regular Session. The Geography of Social Mobility: Sociological Perspectives

Abstract

This paper exploits the natural experiment of German reunification to study the consequences of regime change for social mobility. I analyze whether the associations between social origin and labor market outcomes differ between German men and women who entered the labor market after reunification based on in which of the two German states they lived before reunification. I find no such differences, neither in the pure associations between social origin and labor market outcomes nor in these associations controlling for the moderating role of educational attainment. These findings imply that social origin is a valuable asset on the German labor market independent of in which German state someone grew up. More generally, these results suggest that the intergenerational transmission of advantage is largely unaffected by political change and economic transition.

Author

• Michael Grätz, Nuffield College, University of Oxford