Intergenerational Educational Mobility in Poland in the Long Run: Education as a Positional Good

We investigate the evolution of intergenerational educational mobility in Poland since 1920. We use a novel empirical method allowing for the measurement of mobility at a constant rank in the education distribution, not among education levels. This paper finds that intergenerational mobility increased after WWII. This increase was only temporary. When the new social system stabilized, intergenerational mobility decreased. The transition to a free market economy decreased intergenerational mobility but it recovered after the first 15 years of the transition. Despite these identified fluctuations, intergenerational mobility has been rather stable over time