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The problem with those social mobility scores is they rank it by “chance of going from lowest quintile to highest quintile”. But the quintiles aren't the same.
by refurb 4y ago
The problem with those social mobility scores is they rank it by “chance of going from lowest quintile to highest quintile”.
But the quintiles aren't the same.
A good example is Canada vs the US vs the UK.
The top US income quintile is 153,000 USD.
Canada is 131,000 CAD (98,000 USD).
The UK is 87,000 GBP (105,000 USD).
So you could have less social mobility in the US (going from 1st to 4th quintile) than Canada (1st to 5th), but end up better off financially.
- hagbarth 4y agoI think the reasoning is that you likely won't get out of 1st at all.
- refurb 4y agoBut that's not how economic mobility is generally measured. It's usually movement from bottom to top quintile. The measure is relative mobility within a society, not absolute mobility. But the WEF reference for the grandparent uses a "social mobility index" which includes such factors as: "Adolescent birth rate per 1,000 women", "Pupils per teacher in pre-primary education (%)", "Extent of staff training (1–7 best)", "Internet users (%)", "Meritocracy at work (1–7 best)", so it's clearly quite subjective when it comes to "social mobility".