Previous research on birth order has consistently shown that later-borns have lower educational attainment than first-borns; however, it is not known whether there are birth order patterns in college major. Given evidence that parents disproportionately invest in first-born children, there are likely to be birth order patterns attributable to differences in both opportunities and preferences, related to ability, human capital specialization through parent-child transfers of knowledge, and personality. Birth order patterns in college major specialization may shed light on these explanatory mechanisms and may also account for long-term birth order differences in educational and labour market outcomes. Using Swedish population register data and sibling fixed effects, we find large birth order differences in university applications. First-borns are more likely to apply to, and graduate from, medicine and engineering programs at university, while later-borns are more likely to study journalism and business programs, and to attend art school. We also find that these birth order patterns are stronger in high-socioeconomic status families and that differences in college major explain approximately half of the within-family birth order differences in long-term earnings. These results indicate that early life experiences and parental investment shape sibling differences in ability, preferences, and ambitions even within the shared environment of the family.

'Microclasses', detailed occupational groups, have recently been suggested as being the basis of research in social stratification; occupations represent 'real' social groups in contrast to the purely 'nominal' categories of either 'big class' schemata or socio-economic status scales. The microclass approach in social mobility research has been applied in a recent paper, the authors claiming to show that a strong propensity exists for intergenerational occupational inheritance, and that such inheritance is the dominant factor in social reproduction and limits equality of opportunity. We model a larger version of the same Swedish dataset as used by these authors. We show: (i) that while with many occupational groups a marked degree of intergenerational inheritance occurs among men, such inheritance is far less apparent among women, and, for both men and women, accounts for less than half of the total association in the occupational mobility table; (ii) that the microclass approach does not deal in a theoretically consistent way with the remaining associational underlying patterns of occupational mobility, since appeal is made to the theoretically alien idea of 'socio-economic closeness'; and (iii) that a standard class approach, modified to account for occupational inheritance, can provide a more integrated understanding of patterns of immobility and mobility alike. We also give reasons for doubting whether it will prove possible to establish a theoretically consistent microclass approach to explaining intergenerational mobility propensities. Finally, on the basis of our empirical results and of the relevant philosophical literature, we argue that the microclass approach is unlikely to be helpful in addressing normative questions of equality of opportunity.

‘Microclasses’, detailed occupational groups, have recently been suggested as the basis ofresearch in social stratification; occupations represent ‘real’ social groups in contrast to thepurely ‘nominal’ categories of either ‘big class’ schemata or socioeconomic status scales. In arecent paper, Jonsson et al. apply the microclass approach in social mobility research. Theyclaim to show that a strong propensity exists for intergenerational occupational inheritance, andthat such inheritance is the dominant factor in social reproduction and limits equality ofopportunity. We model the same large-scale Swedish dataset as is used by these authors. Weshow (i) that while with many occupational groups a marked degree of intergenerationalinheritance occurs among men, such inheritance is far less apparent among women, and, forboth men and women, accounts for less than half of the total association in the occupationalmobility table; (ii) that the microclass approach does not deal in a theoretically consistent waywith the remaining association underlying patterns of occupational mobility since appeal is madeto the theoretically alien idea of ‘socioeconomic closeness’; and (iii) that a standard classapproach, modified to account for occupational inheritance, can provide a more integratedunderstanding of patterns of immobility and mobility alike. We also give reasons for doubting ifit will prove possible to establish a theoretically consistent microclass approach to explainingintergenerational mobility propensities. Finally, on the basis of our empirical results and of therelevant philosophical literature, we argue that the microclass approach is unlikely to be helpfulin addressing normative questions of equality of opportunity.

Past research suggests that the migration-induced diversification of everyday living spaces creates uncertainty about shared norms and rules of engagement, leading individuals to “hunker down” and become distrustful. Theory distinguishes between mere exposure and actual contact effects. For mere exposure, the assumption is that ethnic diversity matters even in the absence of one-on-one interactions, as observing the unknown from afar will serve to activate negative prejudice which lowers trust. But diverse environments may also provide opportunities for positive contact, leading individuals to revise their distrust. Improving upon existing studies, we investigate simultaneously the association between group trust and diversity via static and cumulative mere exposure in the neighborhood setting and actual intergroup contact at the workplace, relying on administrative register data rather than self-reporting for our main predictors. We find that trust in neighbors is significantly negatively associated with cumulative exposure to ethnic diversity, while the widely-used measure of current exposure shows no effect. Workplace contact neither has a statistically significant association with trust in neighbors, nor does it mediate the negative association between neighborhood exposure and trust. We thus find some support for the hunkering down hypothesis, but also find that it takes much more precise measures of exposure than studies commonly use to reliably establish this effect.

This thesis consists of four self-contained papers that deal with social reproduction and lifelong learning in Sweden and all use large-scale longitudinal data from public registers.

The first paper analyses inequality by class origin in programme choice at university. It is found that individuals of working class origin choose programs of shorter duration with lower grade point requirements closer to their parents’ home compared to individuals of higher class origin. Children of the higher class instead prefer programs with higher expected earnings and avoid non-traditional institutions. This inequality leads to non-negligible differences in expected labour market outcomes further on.

 The second paper examines the wage gap between individuals of working and higher class origin, given education. By using an unusually detailed measure of education, the net wage gap between classes is found to be considerably smaller compared to standard specifications. The wage gap is found to be relatively small in the public sector, and also somewhat smaller in large compared to small private firms, suggesting that bureaucracy may act as a leveller.

The third paper investigates the relation between economic inequality and the decision to take up studies at the tertiary level late in life. The results show the likelihood of a late entry to be especially high for individuals who are disadvantaged to a moderate extent in terms of current earnings rank and also had some unemployment experience.

The fourth paper addresses life-long learning in tertiary education and its economic returns. Matching techniques are combined with panel data methods to account for non-random selection. The results reveal average positive returns of considerable magnitude on late degrees; between 10 to 20 percentiles in the earnings distribution. The largest effects are found in the lower parts of the earnings distribution.

This paper estimates intergenerational associations in outcomes across more than two generations using cousin correlations. These correlations account for both observed and unobserved factors that cousins share, i.e., the joint influence of family and the community they are exposed to. The results show 1st cousin correlations in GPA, cognitive ability, and years of education above .15. For occupational prestige, the correlations were found to be close to .10. Accounting for detailed parental socio-economic characteristics reduces the correlations by merely one third to one half, which suggest that grandparents contribute over and above parents. For 2nd cousins, sample restriction allows only the study of correlations in 9th grade GPA. The 2nd cousin correlation is estimated to .07 unadjusted and .05 after adjusting for detailed parental characteristics. For 1st and 2nd cousins of grandparents with great economic wealth, the correlations double or triple, and remain very large even after parental characteristics are controlled for. In sum, this indicates strong persistence of inequality across at least four generations in contemporary Sweden.

A number of theoretical models of educational decision-making assume that education is a risky investment, but the empirical evidence of those risks is scant. This article analyses the link between educational failure and future adverse outcomes using Swedish register data. Drawing on the concept of risk inherent in the Breen-Goldthorpe model of educational decision-making-that staying on in school and failing leads to downward mobility-this article estimates the risk of university dropout in terms of future labour market exclusion, where dropouts are compared to never entrants of tertiary education. To rule out unobserved differences between the groups, sibling fixed effects are paired with controls for ability, non-cognitive skills, and life course events. The results show scarring effects of university dropout on labour market marginalization, although the scarring effects are small. This lends some support for the assumption that entering higher levels of education involves a risk of downward mobility.

This paper addresses lifelong learning in tertiary education and its economic returns. Swedish tertiary education is open to older students, and labor market legislation supports employees who take a leave to study. The longitudinal data used for this analysis is based on annual population level registers from 1985 to 2003. Matching techniques are combined with panel data methods to account for non-random selection. Late degrees were found to increase the earnings rank by 15 percentiles on average. The largest effects were found in the lower parts of the earnings distribution.

This paper addresses the economic returns on tertiary degrees obtained in ages above 30 for individuals with upper-secondary schooling in light of current ideas on lifelong learning. Sweden is a case in point: Swedish tertiary education is open to older students, and labor market legislation supports employees who take a leave to study. The longitudinal data used for this analysis is based on annual population level registers from 1981 to 2007. Matching techniques are combined with fixed effect estimation to account for non-random selection. Late degrees were found to increase the employment rate by 18 percentage points and earnings while employed by 12 percent, which indicates strong employment effects and small effects on earnings while employed. The effects were absent in the higher parts of the earnings distribution, and females gained more than men. The estimated effects are largely stable across periods within a birth cohort.

In this article, I investigate the relation between economic inequality and the decision to take up studies at the tertiary level late in life. Who exactly decides to enrol? Is it advantaged or disadvantaged groups in terms of current earnings rank, occupation, unemployment experience and social origin? Using unique register data of university applications and discrete time hazard regression models, the results show the likelihood of a late entry to be especially high for individuals who are disadvantaged to a moderate extent in terms of current earnings rank and also with some unemployment experience. Class differences in the transition to tertiary education decline with age. This suggests, with a moderate amount of simplification, that lifelong learning tends to promote both intra- and intergenerational equality.

This paper uses unique population-level matched employer-employee data on monthly wages to analyse class-origin wage gaps in the Swedish labour market. Education is the primary mediator of class origin advantages in the labour market, but mobility research often only considers the vertical dimension of education. When one uses an unusually detailed measure of education in a horizontal dimension, the wage gap between individuals of advantaged and disadvantaged class origin is found to be substantial (4-5 per cent), yet considerably smaller than when measures are used which only control for level of education and field of study. This is also the case for models with class or occupation as outcome. The class-origin wage gap varies considerably across labour market segments, such as those defined by educational levels, fields of education, industries and occupations in both seemingly unsystematic and conspicuous ways. The gap is small in the public sector, suggesting that bureaucracy may act as a leveller.

The wage gap between individuals of advantaged and disadvantaged class origin is analysed using unique population-level matched employer employee data from Sweden. Using an unusually detailed measure of education, the remaining wage gap is considerably smaller compared to standard specifications. The wage gap is also influenced by geographic segregation. The wage gap varies considerably across industries and occupations, and the reasons for this are discussed. It is small in the public sector, and also smaller in large compared to small private firms, suggesting that bureaucracy may act as a leveller.

Inequality in educational attainment by class background arises because of differences in achievement or in decision making. A unique Swedish population level database on university applications and individuals’ rank of different programs is used to analyze class differences in preferences for different program characteristics using a rank order logit estimator. Compared to individuals from service class backgrounds, individuals from manual labor class backgrounds choose programs of shorter duration with lower grade point requirements closer to their parents’ home. Children from the service class instead prefer programs with higher expected earnings and avoid non-traditional institutions. Taken together, the differences in degree choice lead to non-neglible differences in expected earnings levels and expected unemployment risks further on.

Youth unemployment is a contemporary social problem in many societies. Youths often have limited access to information about jobs and limited social influence, yet little is known about the relationship between social capital and unemployment risk among youth. We study the effect of social capital on unemployment risk in a sample of 19 year olds of Swedish, Iranian, and Yugoslavian origin living in Sweden (N = 1590). We distinguish between two dimensions of social capital: occupational contact networks and friendship networks. First, ego's unemployment is found to be strongly associated with friends' unemployment among individuals of Yugoslavian origins and individuals of Swedish origin, but not Iranian origin. Second, occupational contact networks reduce unemployment risks for all groups, but especially so for Iranians. The effect sizes of the two dimensions are similar and substantial: going from low to high values on these measures is associated with a difference of some 60-70 percent relative difference in unemployment risk. The findings are robust to a number of different model specifications, including a rich set of social origin controls, personality traits, educational performance, friends' characteristics, and friendship network characteristics, as well as controls for geographical employment patterns. A sensitivity simulation shows that homogeneity bias need to be very strong to explain away the effect.

Ethnic acculturation in a sample of 19-year-old individuals of Yugoslavian and Iranian origin in contemporary Sweden was studied, with a focus on how acculturation is contingent on social structure and social context. Acculturation was measured as orientation to the majority and the parental culture of origin. The results suggest, first, that the two dimensions are weakly but positively correlated, meaning that acculturation identity does not involve any trade-offs, as new strands of oppositional culture theory suggest. Second, it was found that ethnic closure in friendship networks is positively associated with orientations to parents' culture and negatively with orientations to Swedish culture. Individuals with a rich occupational social contact network tended to be orientated towards both the majority and the parental culture. There was a marked social difference between the most disadvantaged social class and all other classes, with the former being less oriented to both cultures compared to more advantaged classes.

The position generator is a widespread method for measuring latent social capital in which respondents are queried about contacts on a list of occupations predefined by the analyst. We separate out the unique contribution of each occupation to aggregated measures of social capital. It turns out that this contribution varies vastly: knowing a person in some occupations provides substance to measures of social capital, while knowing a person in a few occupations is irrelevant and contributes statistical noise and causes attenuation bias. We discuss the implication of our findings for the design of position generator measures generally.

Earnings volatility has been linked it to economic integration only through contradictory conjectures. We assess globalization’s role by examining volatility trends in manufacturing, private services, and public services. If trade increases uncertainty, volatility trends should differ markedly across industries since manufacturing, in contrast to especially public services, is exposed to international competition. We analyze earnings trajectories in Sweden 1985-2003, a country and period evincing accelerating trade, finding no indications of greater volatility increases in manufacturing.

Earnings volatility has been linked to economic integration only through contradictory conjectures. We assess globalization's role by examining volatility trends in manufacturing, private services, and public services. If trade increases uncertainty, volatility trends should differ markedly across industries since manufacturing, in contrast to especially public services, is exposed to international competition. We analyze earnings trajectories in Sweden 1985–2003, a country and period evincing accelerating trade, finding no indications of greater volatility increases in manufacturing.

We study the role of family wealth for children's educational achievement using novel Swedish register data. In particular, we focus on the relationship between grandparents' wealth and their grandchildren's educational achievement. Doing so allows us to reliably establish the independent role of wealth in contributing to long-term inequalities in opportunity. We use regression models with extensive controls to account for observed socioeconomic characteristics of families, cousin fixed effects to net out potentially unobserved grandparent effects, and marginal structural models to account for endogenous selection. We find substantial associations between grandparents' wealth and their grandchildren's grade point averages (GPA) in the 9th grade that are only partly mediated by parents' socioeconomic characteristics and wealth. Our findings indicate that family wealth inequality-even in a comparatively egalitarian context like Sweden-has profound consequences for the distribution of opportunity across multiple generations. We posit that our estimates of the long-term consequences of wealth inequality may be conservative for nations other than Sweden, like the United States, where family wealth-in addition to its insurance and normative functions-allows the direct purchase of educational quality and access.

In this paper, we examine mechanisms that generate gaps in educational attainment and labor market outcomes between children of immigrants and children of native Swedes. Theoretical explanations of how social inequality between generations is (re)produced focus on a relative lack of resources within the family and/or in the broader social environment, particularly in neighborhoods and schools. In the empirical analyses we follow over time all individuals who completed compulsory school during the period 1990 -1995 and analyze what types of background factors have influenced their educational and labor market careers, which are measured for the year 2007. On the basis of our empirical results we conclude that the gaps between children of immigrants and children of native Swedes are mainly generated by differences in various forms of resources in the family of origin. The role of neighborhood segregation is less substantial. Moreover, our results indicate that the gaps in employment are larger than the corresponding gaps in educational attainment. When gainfully employed, children of immigrants born in Sweden follow roughly the same path as children from native families in contrast to children born abroad.

We examine the gap in registered crime between the children of immigrants and the children of native Swedes. We follow all individuals who completed compulsory schooling during the period 1990-93 in the Stockholm Metropolitan area (N = 63,462) up to their thirties and analyse how family of origin and neighbourhood segregation during adolescence, subsequent to arriving in Sweden, influence the gap in recorded crimes. For males, we are able to explain between half and three-quarters of the gap in crime by reference to parental socio-economic resources and neighbourhood segregation. For females, we can explain even more, sometimes the entire gap. In addition, we tentatively examine the role of co-nationality or culture by comparing the crime rates of randomly chosen pairs of individuals originating from the same country. We find only a small correlation in the crime of individuals who share the same origin, indicating that culture is unlikely to be a strong cause of crime among immigrants.

We follow Swedish cohorts born between 1976 and 1984 through their educational career and analyze how different dimensions of parents' socio-economic standing (SES) in education, occupation, income, and wealth structure horizontal attainment in secondary tracks and tertiary fields. Our results show that there is strong horizontal segregation by parents' SES. However, the influence of social background dimensions on educational attainment is not uniform, but differ by combination of dimension and track or field. We identify a main contrast between parents' education, and to some extent occupation, on the one hand, and the economic dimensions of income and wealth on the other. When we assess the total contribution of all dimensions, we find that net of previous achievement about 35% of the attainment of different upper-secondary tracks, and 25% of attainment of different tertiary fields is due to social background. Despite the non-uniform pattern, this segregation is also linked to future inequality, i.e. in chances of tertiary graduation linked to upper-secondary tracks and in expected earnings linked to tertiary field choices.

This article examines correlates of social trust and tolerance within a high-violence context. The authors study first the extent to which friendship ties that cross ethnic boundaries are associated with specific interaction spaces (neighborhoods, workplaces, civil society organizations, and political parties) and, second, the extent to which interethnic friendships are associated with trust and tolerance. Using individual-level data (N = 2, 264) on interethnic contacts collected in 2006 in the two northern Iraqi cities of Erbil and Kirkuk, the authors show that people who spend time within ethnically heterogeneous interaction spaces are considerably more likely to have friendship ties that cross ethnic group boundaries and, in turn, also to express general social trust, interethnic trust, and tolerance toward outgroups.

In a replication of the high-profile contribution by Wennerås and Wold on grant peer-review, we investigate new applications processed by the medical research council in Sweden. Introducing a normalisation method for ranking applications that takes into account the differences between committees, we also use a normalisation of bibliometric measures by field. Finally, we perform a regression analysis with interaction effects. Our results indicate that female principal investigators (PIs) receive a bonus of 10% on scores, in relation to their male colleagues. However, male and female PIs having a reviewer affiliation collect an even higher bonus, approximately 15%. Nepotism seems to be a persistent problem in the Swedish grant peer review system.

The authors propose a strategy for observing and explaining workplace variance in categorically linked inequalities. Using Swedish economy-wide linked employer-employee panel data, the authors examine variation in workplace wage inequalities between native Swedes and non-Western immigrants. Consistent with relational inequality theory, the authors' findings are that immigrant-native wage gaps vary dramatically across workplaces, even net of strong human capital controls. The authors also find that, net of observed and fixed-effect controls for individual traits, workplace immigrant-native wage gaps decline with increased workplace immigrant employment and managerial representation and increase when job segregation rises. These results are stronger in high-inequality workplaces and for white-collar employees: contexts in which one expects status-based claims on organizational resources, the central causal mechanism identified by relational inequality theory, to be stronger. The authors conclude that workplace variation in the non-Western immigrant-native wage gaps is contingenton organizational variation in the relative power of groups and the institutional context in which that power is exercised.