Meritocratic Beliefs Across Nations: The Impact of Income Inequality and Higher Education Accessibility

• In Event: 30620 - Section on Inequality, Poverty, and Mobility Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 10: Frontiers in Inequality

Abstract

This study investigates descriptive meritocratic beliefs, which refer to perceptions of whether societies operate as meritocracies in practice. Using data from the International Social Survey Program (2019) and Multilevel Latent Class Analysis (MLCA), this research reveals the heterogeneous nature of meritocratic beliefs at both individual and country levels. At the individual level, three belief patterns emerge: 1) Purely Meritocratic Explanation, which emphasizes meritocratic factors and denies the role of non-meritocratic factors in social advancement; 2) Comprehensive Dual Consciousness, which acknowledges both merit and all non-meritocratic factors (e.g., family SES, gender, and ethnicity) as important for success; 3) and Selective Dual Consciousness, which recognizes the importance of merit and family SES but disregards other non-meritocratic factors. The country-level analysis identifies three patterns: 1) Moderately Meritocratic Countries, where nearly half of the citizens view their nation as purely meritocratic; 2) Less Meritocratic Countries, where about one-fifth of citizens perceive their country as purely meritocratic; 3) and Least Meritocratic Countries, where less than ten percent of citizens perceive their nation as purely meritocratic. The study incorporates covariates into MLCA models, finding that at the individual level, more years of education correlate with a lower likelihood of purely meritocratic views, while upward social mobility predicts higher chances of such views. At the country level, lower national income inequality is associated with a smaller proportion of citizens perceiving their society as purely meritocratic. These findings contribute to a nuanced understanding of meritocratic beliefs and their determinants across different societal contexts.

Authors

• Li Zhu, UC Berkeley

• Xingyao Xiao, University of California Berkeley