Occupational legacy: An analysis of young people in rural work

Abstract

This study aims to analyze the probability of young people living in rural areas performing the same occupations as their parents in the Brazilian labor market, based on the PNADC 2017 - National Continuous Household Sample Survey - and the measure of conditional probabilities. The results show that the profession of the young is marked by the family professional trajectory and family expectations. Male sons inherit their father's occupations, while daughters inherit their mother's occupations. Children whose fathers and mothers are in the same occupation, regardless of gender, are more likely to perform the same occupation as their parents, but this tendency is lower in single-parent families. Occupational legacy may promote a poverty trap whether occupation is secondary, with low wage and precarious work generating a vicious cycle of poverty. Young people are also influenced by their parents in relation to human capital, which will determine their occupation and work remuneration. The higher the educational level of young people the greater the chances of pursuing different professions from their parents. These results confirm the importance of education in rural areas, which contributes to a better quality of life for rural families.

About sad legacies: a study of the intergenerational occupational legacy in Brazil

“…Regarding the unexplained part, this penalized those who followed in their parents’'occupations because if the individuals had not followed their parents' occupational legacy, their salaries would have increased by 25.49% to the percentile q10, of the 10% lowest wages and 14.16% for the highest percentile.This result reinforces the aforementioned analysis that the occupational legacy is a “cursed inheritance” for individuals of lower income classes, which can generate a vicious cycle of poverty, as pointed out by the studies by Gomes et al (2019) and Gomes and Cunha (2015).…”

“…Another relevant factor, in addition to the background to understand the individual's occupation, is the education level of the individuals. As shown in Table 7, the higher the level of human capital, the greater the occupational autonomy, that is, individuals with low education are more likely to follow families’ occupational legacy; for workers with a high level of education, approximately 78% followed their own path regarding the choice of an occupation.The investment in human capital by young people is related to the education level of parents and family income, according to Cunha (2011) and Zago and Bordignon (2012), confirmed by the evidence of the study by Gomes et al (2019).…”

“…Belonging to a urban region reduces the likelihood of offering labor in the Brazilian labor market, in comparison with individuals from rural areas, possibly explained by the fact that rural individuals have to help in family work and thus enter early in the job market. Women are less likely to offer their labor than men, largely because they tend to have more responsibility and care for the home and raising children (Black and Devereux, 2011; Gomes et al , 2019).…”