Working Paper No. 2023-22 - Intergenerational Poverty Persistence in Europe: Is There a ‘Great Gatsby Curve’ for

The strength of the association between current poverty based on the indicators at the core of the EU’s social inclusion process and these measures of parental poverty is assessed and compared across countries. [...] Even when non-labour income is included the focus is still often on the 3 position of the individual (at least in the offspring generation) rather than their household, whereas poverty is generally assessed on the basis of the circumstances of the household. [...] The information sought in the module first covers whether the respondent’s father and mother were present in the household when the respondent was 14 years of age, how many adults and children were in the household then, and the number at work. [...] With the United Kingdom no longer included in EU-SILC Ireland is the only representative of the ‘Anglo-Saxon/liberal’ regime, and is about the middle of the country ranking with the narrow measures but fares worse with the broad measures. [...] However, it is also worth noting that the relationship between persistence and parental poverty is again very much the same whether narrow or broad poverty measures are employed, the correlation with current poverty is greater with the broad than the narrow measure, and the relationship with current poverty is stronger than with parental poverty irrespective of the poverty measures employed.