IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jgames/v16y2025i3p24-d1651396.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mobility Comparisons: Theoretical Definitions and People’s Perceptions

Author

Listed:
  • Michele Bernasconi

    (Department of Economics, University Ca’ Foscari of Venice, Cannareggio 873, 30121 Venezia, Italy)

  • Giulio Cinquanta

    (Department of Economics, University Ca’ Foscari of Venice, Cannareggio 873, 30121 Venezia, Italy)

  • Valentino Dardanoni

    (Department of Economics, Business and Statistics, University of Palermo, Ed. 13, Viale delle Scienze, 90128 Palermo, Italy)

  • Vincenzo Prete

    (Department of Law, University of Palermo, Piazza Bologni 8, 90128 Palermo, Italy)

Abstract

Comparing mobility is an important but controversial issue. In this paper, we argue that in a specific and relevant case, there exists a univocal and non-controversial definition of greater (exchange) mobility that allows for unambiguous comparisons. We conducted a questionnaire experiment to investigate whether people’s perceptions of social mobility align with this definition, and we found that people’s choices are broadly in line with the theoretical predictions.

Suggested Citation

  • Michele Bernasconi & Giulio Cinquanta & Valentino Dardanoni & Vincenzo Prete, 2025. "Mobility Comparisons: Theoretical Definitions and People’s Perceptions," Games, MDPI, vol. 16(3), pages 1-21, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jgames:v:16:y:2025:i:3:p:24-:d:1651396
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4336/16/3/24/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4336/16/3/24/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alesina, Alberto & La Ferrara, Eliana, 2005. "Preferences for redistribution in the land of opportunities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(5-6), pages 897-931, June.
    2. Miles Corak, 2013. "Income Inequality, Equality of Opportunity, and Intergenerational Mobility," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(3), pages 79-102, Summer.
    3. Fields, Gary S. & Ok, Efe A., 1996. "The Meaning and Measurement of Income Mobility," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 71(2), pages 349-377, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yoram Amiel & Michele Bernasconi & Frank Cowell & Valentino Dardanoni, 2015. "Do we value mobility?," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 44(2), pages 231-255, February.
    2. Jolakoski, Petar & Pal, Arnab & Sandev, Trifce & Kocarev, Ljupco & Metzler, Ralf & Stojkoski, Viktor, 2023. "A first passage under resetting approach to income dynamics," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 175(P1).
    3. Andrew E. Clark & Maria Cotofan, 2023. "Are the upwardly mobile more left-wing?," CEP Discussion Papers dp1938, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    4. Neidhöfer, Guido & Serrano, Joaquín & Gasparini, Leonardo, 2018. "Educational inequality and intergenerational mobility in Latin America: A new database," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 329-349.
    5. Baochun Peng & Haidong Yuan, 2021. "Dynamic Fairness: Mobility, Inequality, and the Distribution of Prospects," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 123(4), pages 1314-1338, October.
    6. Reutzel, Fabian, 2024. "The grass is always greener on the other side: (Unfair) inequality and support for democracy," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    7. Julia Baarck & Moritz Bode & Andreas Peichl, 2025. "Rising Inequality, Declining Mobility: The Evolution of Intergenerational Mobility in Germany," CESifo Working Paper Series 12058, CESifo.
    8. Stefan T. Trautmann, 2023. "Procedural fairness and equality of opportunity," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(5), pages 1697-1714, December.
    9. Rene Schwaiger & Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler & Daniel Kleinlercher & Utz Weitzel, 2020. "Unequal Opportunities, Social Groups, and Redistribution: Evidence from the General Population," Working Papers 2020-26, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    10. Lergetporer, Philipp & Werner, Katharina & Woessmann, Ludger, 2020. "Educational inequality and public policy preferences: Evidence from representative survey experiments," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    11. Preuss, Marcel & Reyes, Germán & Somerville, Jason & Wu, Joy, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," VfS Annual Conference 2022 (Basel): Big Data in Economics 264138, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    12. Nathan Deutscher & Bhashkar Mazumder, 2023. "Measuring Intergenerational Income Mobility: A Synthesis of Approaches," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 61(3), pages 988-1036, September.
    13. Alexander Cappelen & Yiming Liu & Hedda Nielsen & Bertil Tungodden, 2024. "Fairness in a Society of Unequal Opportunities," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 506, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    14. Hoy, Christopher & Mager, Franziska, 2021. "American exceptionalism? Differences in the elasticity of preferences for redistribution between the United States and Western Europe," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 192(C), pages 518-540.
    15. Katharina Werner, 2019. "The Role of Information for Public Preferences on Education – Evidence from Representative Survey Experiments," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 82, April.
    16. P. Jenkins, Stephen & Jäntti, Markus, 2013. "Income mobility," ISER Working Paper Series 2013-23, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    17. Schwaiger, Rene & Huber, Jürgen & Kirchler, Michael & Kleinlercher, Daniel & Weitzel, Utz, 2022. "Unequal opportunities, social groups, and redistribution: Evidence from Germany," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    18. Van Der Weide,Roy & Lakner,Christoph & Mahler,Daniel Gerszon & Narayan,Ambar & Nichanametla Ramasubbaiah,Rakesh Gupta, 2021. "Intergenerational Mobility around the World," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9707, The World Bank.
    19. Fehr, Dietmar & Müller, Daniel & Preuss, Marcel, 2024. "Social mobility perceptions and inequality acceptance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 366-384.
    20. Marcel Preuss & Germ'an Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," Papers 2209.00534, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2025.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jgames:v:16:y:2025:i:3:p:24-:d:1651396. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.