Intergenerational Income Mobility in Singapore

The measurement of intergenerational income mobility, or the degree to which income status persists across generations within a family, has been a subject of great interest among social scientists and policymakers. High intergenerational mobility is desirable from the social perspective as it suggests that there is greater equality of opportunity – society offers similar chances of achieving economic success regardless of one's background. Conversely, low mobility implies that children from low income families are more likely to remain poor, and thus presents a case for more active government intervention to "level the playing field".

In this paper, we present measures of intergenerational income mobility in Singapore, derived using a simple methodology originating from Solon (1992). Specifically, we estimate the correlation between measures of fathers' incomes and that of their sons' incomes.

Read more about the intergenerational income mobility study:

• Executive Summary (297 KB)

• IG Income Mobility In Singapore
  
  (833 KB)