The Role of Educational Upgrading in the Formation of Social Inequality

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The project analyses the dynamic processes in the formation of social inequality. At its core is the question how educational upgrading influences or alters the association between social origin and labour market outcomes. It will be investigated how formal and non-formal education activities after a first educational credential either reinforce or attenuate this association over the life course. As labour market outcomes, we will consider both changes in occupational positions and earnings. The NEPS-SC6-ADIAB data will serve as basis for the empirical analyses. This dataset links the Starting Cohort 6 of the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) with social security register data, which are part of the integrated file on administrative data on employment trajectories of the Institute for Employment Research (IAB). This enables the project to draw on very detailed data on educational and employment trajectories of persons born between 1944 and 1986. The project will comprise three subsequent phases. The first phase will be devoted to the consequences of formal and non-formal educational upgrading after labour market entry for social inequality. The second phase will be devoted to the consequences of formal educational upgrading before labour market entry. The third phase will be devoted to identifying the relative contributions of the different forms of educational upgrading to the overall association between social origin and labour market outcomes. By systematically taking on a life-course perspective and through the related dynamic consideration of education in the generative process of social inequality (which is now possible due to the availability of new data sources) the project will deliver new insights for social mobility research.