Do Grandmothers Matter? Grandparental Effects on Occupational Status during the 19th and 20th Centuries in France

• In Event: Inequality, Poverty, and Mobility Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): 11. Intergenerational Inequality and Mobility

Abstract

The impact of grandmothers’ characteristics on the transmission of family resources to grandchildren is often neglected, especially in the historical context. This study asks what the effects of grandmothers’ occupational status was on the occupational status of their grandsons’ and granddaughters’ in the 19th and 20th centuries in France, and how it compared to that of grandfathers’ status. We also study how these effects changed over two centuries. Using TRA data in France, we analyze the status of 2,000 granddaughters and 4,130 grandsons and find that grandfathers’ occupational status mattered for both grandsons’ and granddaughters’ status while grandmothers’ status did not. Over time, the positive influence of grandfathers’ status on grandchildren’s status remained stable.

Author

• Jiaxuan Huang, University of Massachusetts Amherst