Parental Wealth Effects on Living Standards and Asset Holdings: Results from Chile

This paper examines aspects of the replication of inequality across generations and attempts to assess the extent to which parental resources influence the life chances and living standards of adult children. The data come from a survey of 4,400 households in Chile that focused on parental resources and outcomes in children's lives. The results reveal several pathways by which parental resources affect children's economic well-being. In particular, the living standard outcome measures are influenced indirectly, through parental investments in education and earnings capacity, whereas the wealth holdings of families are largly impacted directly, through transfers of parental assets.Chile, wealth, intergenerational transfers, stratification

Spatial Inequality, Migration and Economic Growth in Chile

Between 1975 and 2000, annual per-capita GDP in Chile grew at 5%. Yet, regions did not benefit equally: poverty declined significantly in all regions but regional income inequality remained stagnant. We found that convergence in per-capita income and prodMigration, economic growth, convergence, regional analysis

Is there such thing as middle class values ? Class differences, values and political orientations in Latin America

Middle class values have long been perceived as drivers of social cohesion and growth. This paper investigates the relation between class (measured by position in the income distribution), values, and political orientations using comparable values surveys for six Latin American countries. The analysis finds that both a continuous measure of income and categorical measures of income-based class are robustly associated with values. Both income and class tend to display a similar association to values and political orientations as education, although differences persist in some important dimensions. Overall, there is no strong evidence of any"middle class particularism": values appear to gradually shift with income, and middle class values are between the ones of poorer and richer classes. If any, the only peculiarity of middle class values is moderation. The analysis also finds changes in values across countries to be of much larger magnitude than the ones dictated by income, education, and individual characteristics, suggesting that individual values vary primarily within bounds dictated by each society.Inequality,Economic Theory&Research,Social Inclusion&Institutions,Labor Policies,Access&Equity in Basic Education

Is There Such a Thing As Middle Class Values? Class Differences, Values, and Political Orientations in Latin America - Working Paper 286

Middle class values have long been perceived as drivers of social cohesion and growth. In this paper we investigate the relation between class (measured by the position in the income distribution), values, and political orientations using comparable values surveys for six Latin American countries. We find that both a continuous measure of income and categorical measures of income-based class are robustly associated with values. Both income and class tend to display a similar association to values and political orientations as education, although differences persist in some important dimensions. Overall, we do not find strong evidence of any “middle class particularism”: values appear to gradually shift with income, and middle class values lay between the ones of poorer and richer classes. If any, the only peculiarity of middle class values is moderation. We also find changes in values across countries to be of much larger magnitude than the ones dictated by income, education and individual characteristics, suggesting that individual values vary primarily within bounds dictated by each societyMiddle class, income, values, political orientations

The Raman fingerprint of rhombohedral graphite

Multi-layer graphene with rhombohedral stacking is a promising carbon phase possibly displaying correlated states like magnetism or superconductivity due to the occurrence of a flat surface band at the Fermi level. Recently, flakes of thickness up to 17 layers were tentatively attributed ABC sequences although the Raman fingerprint of rhombohedral multilayer graphene is currently unknown and the 2D resonant Raman spectrum of Bernal graphite not understood. We provide a first principles description of the 2D Raman peak in three and four layers graphene (all stackings) as well as in Bernal, rhombohedral and an alternation of Bernal and rhombohedral graphite. We give practical prescriptions to identify long range sequences of ABC multi-layer graphene. Our work is a prerequisite to experimental non-destructive identification and synthesis of rhombohedral graphite.Comment: 18 pages, 5 pages article + 13 pages supplemental materia

Deserción Escolar y Trabajo Juvenil: ¿Dos Caras de una Misma Decisión?

En Chile, prácticamente todos los niños asisten a la escuela hasta la edad de 13 años. Sin embargo, de allí en adelante comienza un proceso de deserción que es el objeto de estudio de este trabajo. Se estudiará el grupo de edad de 14 a 17 años, que debiera asistir a la educación media. En dichas edades un 10% de la población no asiste a la escuela (dicho porcentaje va de 4% a los 14 años a 16% a los 17 años). Estudiaremos las decisiones de desertar o asistir y la de participar en la fuerza laboral conjuntamente, en parte con la intención de determinar si son como dos caras de un mismo proceso de decisión. Los jóvenes que desertan del sistema educacional, no sólo tienen como opción trabajar en una empresa, sino también hacerlo en la casa, o permanecer inactivos. En efecto, sólo un 44% de los que desertaron en 1996 se incorporaron a la fuerza de trabajo. Este trabajo, como otros trabajos empíricos para otros países, encuentra que cambios en el ingreso tienen efectos marginales muy pequeños sobre las decisiones de desertar y trabajar. Se concluye que efectivamente es necesario analizar conjuntamente la decisión de estudiar, o desertar y la de trabajar. En muchos aspectos ambas decisiones pueden considerarse dos caras de un mismo proceso de decisión, no lo son completamente ya que hay jóvenes que desertan y no trabajan en el mercado, ya que se quedan en el hogar.

Intergenerational Influences of Wealth in Mexico

Using the 2006 Mexican Social Mobility Survey, this research evaluates the influence of parental wealth on several outcomes of adult children, including educational attainment, consumption level, asset holdings, home ownership, and value of residence. Two mechanisms of parental influence on economic wellbeing are explored: an indirect effect mediated by parental investment in human capital, and the direct transfer of resources. Three main findings emerge from the analysis. First, parental wealth is a strong determinant of educational attainment, net of the standard indicators of advantage regularly used in stratification research, and the influence of wealth is stronger among the most disadvantaged children (those with low cultural capital, and residing in non-urban areas). Second, the mechanism of parental influence on adult children's economic wellbeing differs depending on the outcome: In the case of consumption level, the influence is largely indirect, mediated by parental investment in offspring's human capital, while the opposite is true for children's asset holdings, where a direct transfer of resources predominates. Third, while access to homeownership is only weakly stratified by parent's and children's resources, the value of the acquired home is significantly affected by parental wealth. These patterns of influence are similar to those found in Chile (Spilerman and Torche 2004, Torche and Spilerman 2006) and they highlight the critical impact of parental wealth in less developed countries