Dynamic Inequalities The Impact of Social Stratification Determinants on Poverty Dynamics in Europe Leen VANDECASTEELE KATHOLIEKE UNIVERSITEIT LEUVEN FACULTEIT SOCIALE WETENSCHAPPEN Promotores: Proefschrift tot het verkrijgen Prof. Dr. J. Berghman van de graad van Onderzoekseenheid: Centrum voor Sociologisch Onderzoek [CeSO] Doctor in de Sociale Wetenschappen Prof. Dr. R. Muffels aangeboden door [Faculteit Sociale Wetenschappen, Universiteit van Tilburg, Nederland] Leen VANDECASTEELE 2007 KATHOLIEKE UNIVERSITEIT LEUVEN FACULTEIT SOCIALE WETENSCHAPPEN Dynamic Inequalities The Impact of Social Stratification Determinants on Poverty Dynamics in Europe Leen VANDECASTEELE Proefschrift tot het verkrijgen van de graad van Doctor in de Sociale Wetenschappen Nr. 119 Samenstelling van de examencommissie: Prof. Dr. J. Berghman (promotor), Prof. Dr. R. Muffels (mede-promotor) [Universiteit van Tilburg, Nederland], Prof. Dr. J. Billiet, Prof. Dr. F. Lammertyn, Prof. Dr. I. Nicaise, Prof. Dr. C. Whelan [Economic and Social Research Institute, Ierland]; Prof. Dr. K. Roe (voorzitter) 2007 De verantwoordelijkheid voor de ingenomen standpunten berust alleen bij de auteur. Gepubliceerd door: Faculteit Sociale Wetenschappen - Onderzoekseenheid: Centrum voor Sociologisch Onderzoek [CeSO], K.U.Leuven, Parkstraat 45 Bus 3601 - 3000 Leuven, België. © 2007 by the author. Niets uit deze uitgave mag worden verveelvoudigd zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de auteur / No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the permission in writing from the author. D/2007/8978/7 TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 LIST OF FIGURES 11 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 13 INTRODUCTION 17 1 SOCIAL STRATIFICATION: DEFINITION AND HISTORICAL OVERVIEW 22 1.1 What is social stratification? 22 1.1.1 Differentiation, inequality and stratification 22 1.1.2 Determinants and resources 24 1.1.3 Dimensions of a stratification system 25 1.1.4 Operational definition of social stratification 26 1.2 An overview of modern social stratification theorising 27 1.2.1 The context of early social stratification theory 27 1.2.2 Two founding fathers: Karl Marx and Max Weber 28 1.2.3 A brief overview of post-war social stratification thinking 29 1.3 Some important social stratification determinants 31 1.3.1 Occupation-based social stratification determinants: social class and social status 31 1.3.2 Level of education 35 1.3.3 Ascribed social stratification determinants: gender, race and ethnicity 36 1.3.4 An alternative to structural inequality: cultural difference 38 1.3.5 Multiple determinants of social inequality: how to combine them? 38 1.4 Inequality based on ‘achieved’ social positions: justified inequality? 40 1 1.5 Discussion 41 2 THE SOCIAL STRATIFICATION OF INCOME INEQUALITY AND POVERTY: EVIDENCE FROM EMPIRICAL RESEARCH 44 2.1 Introduction 44 2.2 Important social stratification determinants of income inequality and poverty 44 2.2.1 Gender and income poverty 44 2.2.2 Education and income inequality 46 2.2.3 Occupational stratification of income inequality 47 2.3 Multidimensional relationships between education, occupation and income 49 2.3.1 Status consistency 49 2.3.2 Causal pathways towards income attainment 51 2.4 Discussion 51 3 DYNAMICS OF INEQUALITY: CHALLENGES FOR A LATE MODERN SOCIAL STRATIFICATION PERSPECTIVE ON INCOME INEQUALITY AND POVERTY 54 3.1 The background: insecurities and opportunities in late modernity 54 3.1.1 Changes in the occupational structure 55 3.1.2 Flexibility in the labour market 57 3.1.3 Insecurities in the family sphere 59 3.1.4 Discussion: late modernity as breeding ground for dynamics in the social structure 63 3.2 Challenges for the social stratification of poverty and income inequality 64 3.2.1 Dynamics of poverty 64 3.2.2 The relevance of social stratification at the end of the 20th century 67 3.2.2.1 Individualisation and democratisation of poverty 67 2 3.2.2.2 End of social class? 68 3.2.3 The dynamics of social class: intragenerational social mobility 70 3.2.4 A life course perspective on poverty inequality 72 3.3 Discussion 75 4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND CONCEPTUAL MODEL 78 5 METHODOLOGY 86 5.1 Research design 86 5.1.1 A quantitative survey approach 86 5.1.2 Longitudinal panel design 88 5.1.3 A multi-country study 89 5.1.4 Secondary data analysis 90 5.2 The European Community Household Panel Data 91 5.2.1 An introduction to the dataset 91 5.2.2 Sampling design 93 5.2.3 Structure of the household panel 94 5.2.4 Assessment of response in the ECHP 98 5.3 Operationalisation of main concepts 103 5.3.1 Poverty 103 5.3.1.1 Conceptual and operational definition of poverty 103 5.3.1.2 Construction of equivalised household income poverty 104 5.3.1.3 Poverty in a longitudinal perspective 107 5.3.2 Social stratification determinants 111 5.3.2.1 Gender 111 5.3.2.2 Level of education 112 5.3.2.3 Social class 112 5.3.2.4 Level of measurement of social stratification determinants 115 5.3.3 Intragenerational social mobility 116 5.3.4 Life course events 117 3 6 THE SOCIAL STRATIFICATION OF POVERTY AND ITS DYNAMICS: THE STATE OF THE ART 118 6.1 Introduction 118 6.2 A longitudinal poverty pattern 119 6.3 The gender stratification of poverty dynamics 123 6.4 Level of education and poverty dynamics 128 6.5 Social class and poverty dynamics 132 6.6 A multivariate model for the longitudinal poverty pattern 136 6.7 Conclusion 139 7 INCOME AND POVERTY DYNAMIC CONSEQUENCES OF SOCIAL MOBILITY 140 7.1 Introduction 140 7.2 Method 144 7.3 An assessment of the openness in European countries 147 7.3.1 Social mobility, income mobility and poverty: an overview 147 7.3.2 The micro-level association between social mobility and income/ poverty dynamics 149 7.3.3 Poverty entry and social mobility in the household 151 7.4 Income and poverty dynamic effects of social mobility patterns 153 7.4.1 The distribution of social mobility patterns 153 7.4.2 Personal income dynamic consequences of social mobility 155 7.4.3 Low income dynamic consequences of social mobility 159 7.4.4 Poverty dynamic effects of social mobility in the household 162 7.5 Discussion 165 8 THE STRUCTURING IMPACT OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION DETERMINANTS AND LIFE COURSE EVENTS ON POVERTY TRANSITIONS IN EUROPE 168 4 8.1 Introduction 168 8.2 Research questions 169 8.3 Method 171 8.4 Results 172 8.4.1 The occurrence of life course events for different social groups 172 8.4.2 The relative importance of life course events and social stratification determinants as predictors of poverty entry in European countries 175 8.4.3 Do risky life events have the same poverty-triggering effect for all social groups? 180 8.5 Discussion 189 9 THE SOCIAL STRATIFICATION OF POVERTY TRAJECTORIES AFTER NEGATIVE LIFE COURSE EVENTS 192 9.1 Introduction 192 9.2 Research questions and hypotheses 193 9.3 Method 196 9.4 Poverty patterns after partnership dissolution, job loss and leaving the parental home 198 9.4.1 Poverty patterns after partnership dissolution 198 9.4.2 Poverty patterns after job loss 201 9.4.3 Poverty patterns after leaving the parental home 205 9.5 Social stratification determinants of the different poverty trajectories 207 9.5.1 The social stratification of poverty trajectories after partnership dissolution 208 9.5.2 The social stratification of poverty trajectories after job loss 210 9.5.3 The social stratification of poverty trajectories after leaving the parental home 212 9.6 Discussion 214 5 CONCLUSION 218 BIBLIOGRAPHY 226 APPENDIX - CHAPTER 5 246 APPENDIX – CHAPTER 6 247 A.6.1 The weight used in analyses with the longitudinal poverty pattern 247 A.6.2 Distributions of the social stratification determinants according to poverty pattern 249 A.6.3 Distributions of the social stratification determinants according to poverty pattern 250 APPENDIX – ABSTRACTS 255 APPENDIX – DOCTORATEN IN DE SOCIALE WETENSCHAPPEN 261 6 LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1 - Types of assets and resources underlying stratification systems 25 Table 1.2 - Social class and social status perspective on social stratification 34 Table 3.1 - Divorce rates in selected Western European countries, 1970-1993 61 Table 3.2 - Single parent families as a percentage of all families with dependent children, selected years, Western Europe 62 Table 3.3 - Poverty Profiles in Europe, 60% of Median Income, ECHP, 1994- 1998 (Percentages)* 66 Table 5.1 - Household and individual achieved sample sizes in the ECHP (wave 1, by country) 94 Table 5.2 - Number of poverty entries during participation in ECHP (all countries) 97 Table 5.3 - Initial response rate in the ECHP, household sample, by country 99 Table 5.4 - Participation patterns in the ECHP (wave 1 participants, 1994-2001, by country) 100 Table 5.5 - Summarising statistics for the lagged and time-lag corrected equivalised household income measures: weighted mean and Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test of paired-differences between the means (ECHP, wave 3, by country, weighted) 106 Table 5.6 - Association between time-lagged and time-lag corrected poverty measure, expressed in percentages (ECHP, wave 3, pooled dataset, cross-sectionally weighted) 107 Table 5.7 - Percentage of sample persons with a censored poverty pattern (ECHP, 1994-2001, by country) 109 Table 5.8 - The proposed social class scheme 114 Table 6.1 - Distribution of the longitudinal poverty pattern in European countries (ECHP, 1994-2000 , initial sample persons, weighted) 120 Table 6.2 - Distribution of the longitudinal poverty pattern for censored cases (ECHP, 1994-2000, weighted) 121 Table 6.3 - Poverty entry probability for individuals with a female and male household