American Economic Association

Understanding Unequal Economic Opportunity

Author(s): Samuel Bowles
Source: The American Economic Review, Vol. 63, No. 2, Papers and Proceedings of the
Eighty-fifth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association (May, 1973), pp. 346-
356
Published by: American Economic Association
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 Understanding Unequal Economic
Opportunity
By SAMUEL BOWLES*
An important objective of liberal social
reform in the United States has been to
render one's chances of economic success
independent of one's race, sex, or family
socioeconomic background. Public concern
about economic inequality has focused less
upon the degree of inequality itself (as
measured by the size distribution of in-
come) as upon the processes by which
some individuals wind up rich and others
poor. It is inequality of opportunity not
inequality itself that offends the modern
liberal conscience.
The economic advantage accruing to
whites and males is widely recognized and
deplored. Yet even among white males,
the chances of receiving high or low in-
comes differ widely for individuals whose
parents had attained differing levels of
education, occupational status, and in-
come. For "non-Negro" males from non-
farm backgrounds, the correlation between
a composite index of socioeconomic back-
ground and income ranges from .35 to .45,
depending on the age of the worker. (I will
use this correlation as a simple measure of
the degree of inequality of (income-
earning) opportunity. Similarly, I use the
correlation between socioeconomic back-
ground and years of educational attain-
ment as a measure of inequality of educa-
* Associate professor of economics, Harvard Univer-
sity (on leave), and Visiting Professor, University of
Massachusetts. The material presented here is the re-
sult of a collaborative effort with Herbert Gintis. I am
indebted also to Valerie Nelson and to members of the
Harvard Union of Radical Economics Seminar for criti-
cism and assistance. The research reported here was
supported financially by a grant from the Ford Founda-
tion.
346
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tional opportunity.) While this statistic
tells us little about the extent to which the
probability of getting rich is contingent
upon family background for particular
groups of individuals, we can understand
the magnitude of inequality of opportunity
asssociated with such a correlation by hy-
pothesizing a simplified version of actual
mobility processes in which the distribu-
tion of the two variables socioeconomic
background and income are bivariate
normal. Using this assumption, and data
for 35 to 44-year-olds, the relationship be-
tween family background and income can
be illustrated as in Table 1. While it is
clear that most of the variance of income
is not explained by socioeconomic back-
ground (at least as measured by occupa-
TABLE 1-PROBABILITY OF BEING IN SELECTED DEC-
ILES OF THE INCOME DISTRIBUTION FOR INDIVIDUALS
OF SELECTED SOCIOECONOmIC BACKGROUND DECILESB
Socioeconomic
Background Income (Selected Deciles)
(Selected Deciles) 1st 3rd 7th 10th
1st 27.2 13.7 5.2 1.2
3rd 14.1 12.9 8.9 4.0
7th 5.5 9.0 11.7 11.2
10th 1.2 3.8 10.7 27.2
a The conditional probabili
were not observed directly, but were calculated from a
simple correlation between income and a composite
measure of socioeconomic background. See text. The
correlation on which this table is based is .45 and refers
to "non-Negro", 35 to 44-year-old males from nonfarm
backgrounds. The figures in the table indicate the
probability of receiving income in the indicated decile
of the distribution of income for an individual whose
parents' occupational status, educational level, and
income place him at the midpoint of the indicated socio-
economic background decile.
VOL. 63 NO. 2 DETERMINANTS OF INDIVIDUAL INCOMES 347
tional status, educational level, and in-
come), it is equally evident that an indi-
vidual's chances of getting ahead economi-
cally are strongly influenced by one's
family origins.
Evidence presented in Peter Blau and
0. D. Duncan suggests that the extent of
intergenerational status immobility in the
United States has been quite stable over
the past half century. Moreover, inter-
national comparisons of intergenerational
status transmission as summarized by
S. M. Miller, S. M. Lipset, and Lipset and
R. Bendix indicate that among relatively
rich countries, capitalist and state socialist
alike, the extent of intergenerational im-
mobility is strikingly similar. The fact that
the influence of family background upon
economic and social advancement is both
quantitatively significant and appears to
be relatively stable across a variety of
historical periods and political systems
suggests that an explanation of intergener-
ational immobility must focus on processes
which are common to the advanced coun-
tries in the modern era.
A number of explanations of inter-
generational economic status transmission
have been proposed. Abstracting from
those which rely primarily upon the inheri-
tance of tangible wealth (which is the
subject of John Brittain's paper in this
panel), three major interpretations may
be distinguished. The first, and probably
most widespread view, is that economic
status is passed from generation to genera-
tion through inequality of educational
opportunity. This interpretation, elabo-
rated by T. W. Schultz, Gary Becker, Blau
and Duncan, and others, provided the
theoretical underpinnings for the assault on
poverty during the decade of the 1960's.
The disappointing results of the War on
Poverty have given impetus to a revival
of a second and third interpretation. Both
the second and third views offer an expla-
nation of inequality of educational oppor-
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tunity as well as of inequality of economic
opportunity itself. Some writers have lo-
cated the mechanism for the intergenera-
tional perpetuation of inequality in the
family itself. Thus, Edward Banfield,
D. P. Moynihan, Oscar Lewis, Melvin
Kohn, and others have hypothesized that
inequality is reproduced through the inter-
generational replication of differing time
horizons, attitudes, and other subcultural
patterns. While the "culture of poverty"
theorists focus upon the differing aspira-
tions, personality characteristics, and other
noncognitive traits of individuals from
differing family backgrounds, the third
interpretation locates the process of inter-
generational status transmission in the
inheritance of intellectual skills. According
to this view, most recently put forth by
Richard Herrnstein, the poor are poor be-
cause they are intellectually incompetent;
their incompetence is particularly intrac-
table because it is rooted in the genetic
structure inherited from their poor and
also intellectually inferior parents. An
explanation of the intergenerational repro-
duction of the class structure is thus found
in the heritability of IQ.
In this paper I will present the results
of research on the sources of intergenera-
tional immobility and outline an interpre-
tation of my findings. In the first section
I will develop and estimate a simple model
of the process whereby socioeconomic
background influences individuals' in-
comes. The only data available for the
estimation of the model is from a sample
which excludes blacks, women, people of
farm backgrounds, and the very old and
very young. Thus, my empirical analysis is
limited to a consideration of inequality of
opportunity among what is a relatively
privileged group, most of whom are em-
ployed in what are coming to be known as
primary labor markets. The paper by R.
Edwards, D. Gordon, and M. Reich in this
volume offers a highly complementary
348 AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION MAY 1973
analysis of the stratification of the entire
labor force through the segmentation of
labor markets and other mechanisms.
The empirical estimates of the model
imply that the contribution of the genetic
inheritance of IQ to the intergenerational
status transmission process is trivial. In-
equality of educational opportunity ap-
pears to play a significant role. More than
half of the intergenerational status corre-
lation, however, is accounted for by the
direct effects of family socioeconomic
background, operating independentiy of
educational attainments and IQ. In the
second section I offer as an interpretation
of these results a theory of inequality of
opportunity in capitalist society suffi-
ciently general to take account of racial,
sexual, and other forms of inequality not
explicitly considered in the empirical
analysis. A conclusion of this analysis is
that the intergenerational reproduction of
economic inequality operates in large mea-
sure through a correspondence between
the social relations of production on the
one hand and the social relations of educa-
tion and of family life on the other. In the
concluding section, I argue that significant
progress towards equality of economic op-
portunity will depend upon a radical re-
structuring of the social organization of
production.
I. A Statistical Model of Intergenerational
Immobility
The relative importance of the genetic
inheritance of IQ, inequality of educa-
tional opportunity, and direct income ef-
fects of family status in determining the
correlation between socioeconomic back-
ground and income may be estimated us-
ing the simple recursive model of income
determination presented in Figure 1. In
that figure, variables on the left are posited
as causally prior to those on the right. The
arrows indicate directions of causation.
(The numbers next to the arrows are the
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Genotypic
IQ .900 Childhood
/1 b I ' . 2 5 .051
.219 (a .200 .562 :;Years of.272
9 Schooling d4 Income
Socio-economic g
Background
FIGURE 1. RECURSIVE MODEL OF INTERGENERA-
TIONAL EFFECTS ON INCOME
estimated normalized regression coeffi-
cients which I will consider shortly.) The
double-headed arrow represents a simple
correlation with no posited direction of
causation. An extensive discussion of this
model, the data and methods used to esti-
mate it, and the caveats concerning the in-
terpretation of the results is presented in
Bowles (1972a and 1972b).
The normalized regression coefficients
and zero order correlations used in this
study are based on data for 35 to 44-year-
old, non-Negro, male workers from non-
farm backgrounds. The primary source of
the data is a 1962 Current Population
Survey, augmented by data from the Na-
tional Opinion Research Center and other
sources. The observed correlations have
been corrected for errors in measurement,
using independent information on the reli-
ability of each measure, and for restricted
variance in one of the samples. The corre-
lations involving childhood IQ are based
on a sample collected by the California
Guidance Study. The correlation of child-
hood IQ (measured at age 6-8) and adult
income is estimated using the assumption
that the direct effect of childhood IQ upon
income operates entirely through adult
levels of cognitive proficiency, as measured
by the Armed Forces Qualification Test.
(Childhood IQ influences income indirectly
through its effect on years of educational
attainment.)
The relationship between socioeconomic
background and genotypic IQ on the one
hand, and childhood IQ on the other are
VOL. 63 NO. 2 DETERMINANTS OF INDIVIDUAL INCOMES 349
based on the following assumptions, se-
lected deliberately to yield an upper bound
estimate of the role of genetic inheritance
of IQ in the intergenerational transmission
of economic status. First, I have assumed,
following Arthur Jensen, that the herita-
bility of IQ is .81, implying a normalized
regression coefficient of .9 for a genotypic
IQ. Second, I have assumed that the im-
pact of socioeconomic background consti-
tutes one-half of a minimal estimate of the
environmental effects on IQ. Thus the
normalized equation for childhood IQ
reads:
Childhood IQ = .9 Genotypic IQ
+ .2 Socioeconomic Background
The remaining estimated normalized re-
gression coefficients presented in Figure 1
are all significant at the .95 level.
The correlation between socioeconomic
background and income may be decom-
posed into the following additive compo-
nents :'
(a) a direct effect of family socioeco-
nomic background (indicated in
Figure 1 by the letter g);
(b) an indirect effect of family back-
ground operating through the influ-
ence of socioeconomic background
upon years of educational attain-
ment (hd plus hec);
(c) an indirect effect of socioeconomic
background operating through en-
vironmental effects on childhood
IQ, and, thence, directly upon in-
come, (c); and
1 The derivation of this decomposition is based on the
normal equations of the linear regression model. Thus, if
xo = Pioxi + * ' * + pnOxn + it
the correlation ro,i may be expressed
toi pjorji forj= 1, ,n;
b Letters in parentheses refer to the normalized re-
gression coefficients
where rij is the simple correlation between variables
Figure 1 and
and xj and pjo is the normalized regression indicate the method
coefficient
variable j in an equation predicting variable
effect. xO.
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(d) an effect operating via the correla-
tion of socioeconomic background
with genotypic IQ and, thence,
through the effect of genotypic IQ
upon childhood (phenotypic, i.e.,
measured) IQ, and, thence, both
directly upon income and indirectly
via the years of educational attain-
ment (fba plus heba).
T he empirical decomposition of the
correlation between socioeconomic back-
ground and income is presented in Table
2. The genetic inheritance of IQ (even as-
suming a relatively high degree of heri-
tability) accounts for only a miniscule
portion of intergenerational immobility.
This may seem particularly surprising in
view of the substantial impact of childhood
IQ upon years of schooling.
The contribution of inequality of edu-
cational opportunity to the correlation
between socioeconomic background and
income is significant. (An analogous calcu-
lation using occupational status as the
dependent variable shows inequality of
educational opportunity to be of consider-
ably greater importance (Bowles, 1972b).)
By far the largest contribution, however,
is the direct effect of socioeconomic back-
TABLE 2-DECOMPOSITION OF THE SIMPLE CORRELA-
TION (r) BETWEEN SOCIOECONOmIC BACK-
GROUND (SEB) AND INcOMEa
Intergenerational Contribution to r
Income Effectsb Absolute Percentage
Direct Family SEB effect (g) .25 55
Indirect SEB effect via School-
ing (hd+hec) .17 39
Indirect SEB effect via Child-
hood IQ(fc) .01 2
Genotypic IQ effect (fba+heba) .02 4
Total (r) .45 100
a Calculation based
andxi
simple correlation coefficient in
of of calculation of each
350 AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION MAY 1973
ground. Estimates for three additional age
groups-both younger and older are con-
sistent with the results presented here. The
evidence suggests that an understanding
of the intergenerational effects upon in-
come requires a more detailed description
of the way in which family background is
translated into higher income opportuni-
ties, both directly and through the medium
of schooling.
II. Towards A Theory of Intergenerational
Immobility
In this section I seek to explain how
socioeconomic background interacts with
schooling to influence an individual's
chances of economic success and in so do-
ing to reproduce a family's level of income
and economic status.2 I begin with an ob-
vious point: in capitalist society the in-
come of the vast majority of individuals
derives predominately from the sale of
their labor services to employers. An ade-
quate explanation of the intergenerational
transfer of economic status thus requires
understanding (a) the criteria used by
employers in hiring, promotion, and pay;
and (b) the way in which family structure
and schooling function to allocate those
attributes relevant to employers' criteria
among individuals of differing levels of
socioeconomic background. Thus, an in-
quiry into the intergenerational immobil-
ity process must focus on the supply, de-
mand, and production of those personal
attributes and ascriptive traits which are
relevant to getting ahead in the world of
work. I will begin with the demand for
personal attributes by employers.
Three immediate objectives of em-
ployers seem relevant to the formulation of
job-adequacy criteria: the technical effi-
ciency of the productive process; the main-
tenance of secure top-down control over
production; and the legitimation of the
2 This section represents a brief summary of material
described in greater detail in Bowles and Gintis. jobs and high income. Gintis and I have
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authority structure and property relations
of the enterprise. Pursuit of these objec-
tives serves the employers' dual interest in
making profits and perpetuating or en-
hancing their social class position.
From these employer objectives, we
may derive some insight into the demand
for particular worker attributes. Five im-
portant sets of worker characteristics will
be considered, the first being cognitive
attributes, such as scholastic achievement,
as well as concrete technical and opera-
tional skills (e.g., knowing how to do typ-
ing, accounting, chemical engineering, or
carpentry). Second, there are personality
traits (such as motivation, perseverance,
docility, dominance, flexibility, or tact)
which enable the individual to operate
effectively in a work role. Third, there are
traits which I will call modes of self-
presentation, such as manner of speech
and dress, patterns of peer identification
and perceived "social distance" from indi-
viduals and groups of different social posi-
tion. These traits do not necessarily con-
tribute to the worker's execution of tasks,
but may be valuable to employers in their
effort to stabilize, validate, and legitimize
the particular structure of work roles in
the organization as a whole. Similar in
function is a fourth set of traits: ascrip-
tive characteristics such as race, sex, and
age. Finally, I will consider the role of
credentials, such as level and prestige of
education, which, like modes of self-
presentation and the ascriptive traits, are
a resource used by employers to add to the
overall legitimacy of the social organiza-
tion of production.
The analytical problem, of course, is to
determine the precise content of these five
factors, and how each affects the income
determination process.
The first type of worker attributes
cognitive abilities appears to be of lim-
ited
importance in access to prestigious
VOL. 63 NO. 2 DETERMINANTS OF INDIVIDUAL INCOMES 351
shown that adult cognitive abilities exert
a relatively minor influence on success
(measured by a composite index of income
and occupational status) independent of
level of schooling and socioeconomic back-
ground. These results are consistent with
the findings of a Norwegian study de-
scribed in P. deWolff and A. van Slijpe as
well as work by Zvi Griliches and William
Mason, and others. Moreover, Gintis
(1971), drawing on a number of different
data sets, showed that the quite sub-
stantial simple correlation between years
of schooling and income cannot be ex-
plained by the role of schools in develop-
ing or identifying cognitive abilities.
All four of the remaining types of per-
sonal attributes personality traits rele-
vant to the work task, modes of self-
presentation, ascriptive traits, and cre-
dentials appear to be integral to the
process of intergenerational immobility.
The personality traits required of "effi-
cient" workers must correspond by and
large to the requirements of harmonious
integration into the bureaucratic order of
the enterprise. The social relations of pro- office or work group. In addition, Ed-
duction under corporate capitalism char-
acterized by a fragmentation of tasks,
absence of worker control or ownership,
and a bureaucratically structured hier-
archical division of labor determine the
personality traits required of workers.
Some of these are general traits valuable
to the employer at all levels of hierarchy
and status. All workers must be depend-
able (i.e., follow rules) and be properly
subordinate to authority. Further, all
workers must respond adequately to the
external incentives of the organization-
the crudest being threat of dismissal, and these personal attributes to be important
the more subtle including the possibility
of promotion to higher status, authority,
or pay.
While these requirements hold for all
workers, there are important qualitative
differences among levels. These tend to
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follow directly from differences in the
scope of independent decision making,
which increases with hierarchical status.
Thus the lowest level of worker must sim-
ply refrain from breaking rules. On the
highest level, it becomes crucial that the
worker internalize the values of the
organization, act out of personal initiative,
and know when not to go by the book. In
between, workers must be methodical,
predictable, and persevering and, at a
somewhat higher level, must respond
flexibly to their superiors.
Much of this description of functional
personal attributes of job performance is
based on the work of Richard Edwards and
has been supported by his empirical re-
search. Edwards compared supervisor rat-
ings of workers with a set of thirty-two
personality ratings by the workers' peers.
In a large sample of Boston workers, he
finds that a cluster of three personality
traits- which he summarizes as respect for
rules, dependability, and internalization of
the norms of the firm predict strongly
supervisor ratings of workers in the same
wards noted that respect for rules was
most important at the lower occupational
levels, dependability appearing strongly
for middle levels, and internalization of
the norms of the firm predicting super-
visor ratings best at the higher levels.
When we pass to the literature docu-
menting the importance of self-presenta-
tion as attributes relevant to the alloca-
tion of individuals to status positions, we
are faced with a difficult problem of
assessment. Numerous studies, summa-
rized by Erving Goff man, have shown
(albeit often covert) criteria for hiring and
promotion. Gloria Shaw Hamilton and
J. David Roesner, for example, found that
among employers of "disadvantaged"
workers, "personal appearance" was be-
tween three and two times as important a
352 AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION MAY 1973
selection criterion as any of the following:
work experience, specific job training, high
school diploma, or test scores.
We may now consider the importance of
our last two sets of employability traits:
ascriptive characteristics (race, age, sex)
and acquired credentials (e.g., educa-
tional degrees). T he legitimation of the
hierarchical division of labor, as well as
the smooth day-to-day control over the
work process, requires that the authority
structure of the enterprise with its cor-
responding structure of pay and privilege
-respect the wider society's ascriptive
and symbolic distinctions. In particular,
socially acceptable relations of domination
and subordination must be respected:
white over black; male over female; old
(but not aged) over young; and schooled
over unschooled.
I make no claim that these social prej-
udices originated as a capitalist contriv-
ance, though a strong case could probably
be made that the form and strength of
both sexism and racism in the United
States derive in large measure from the
particular historical development of cap-
italist institutions in the United States and
Europe. Save credentialist distinctions,
all predate the modern capitalist era.
"Rational business practice" has simply
reinforced and extended them. The cre-
dentialist mentality, as Gintis and I have
argued, was indeed contrived in the early
decades of the century to perpetuate the
concept of social rank in a society increas-
ingly eschewing distinctions of birth.
The individual employer, acting singly,
normally takes societal values and beliefs
as data, violating as few as possible, and
using those which will add to the technical
efficiency, top-down control, or legitimacy
of the enterprise. In this way the pursuit
of profits and security of class position
reinforces the racist, sexist, and credential-
ist mentality.
If these four sets of noncognitive worker
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traits work-related personality character-
istics, modes of self-presentation, ascrip-
tive characteristics, and credentials are
central to the process of income determi-
nation, an understanding of the transmis-
sion of economic status from generation to
generation requires that we discover how
these worker characteristics are acquired.
T he ascriptive traits are, of course, ac-
quired at birth, or, in the case of age, in-
escapably as life progresses, so little need
be said of them. The acquisition of
educational credentials requires survival
in the school system and is an arduous but
not particularly complex process. The way
in which workers come to have a particular
set of work-relevant personality character-
istics or modes of self-presentation requires
a more searching analysis.
Gintis (1970) and I (1971) have argued
at some length that the social relations of
schooling are a reflection of the social rela-
tions of production. The school is a
bureaucratic order with hierarchical au-
thority, rule-orientation, stratification by
"ability" (tracking) as well as by age,
role differentiation by sex (physical educa-
tion, home economics, shop), and a system
of external incentives (marks, promise of
promotion, and threat of failure) much
like pay and status in the sphere of work.
Thus schools are likely to develop in
students traits corresponding to those re-
quired on the job. Gintis (1971) has shown
that higher grades in high school courses
are awarded to students exhibiting per-
sonality traits associated with subor-
dinacy, discipline, and rule-following even
when the level of scholastic achievement is
controlled for. The economic importance of
these aspects of school structure is strongly
suggested by Edwards' analysis of data on
high school records and work super-
vision ratings collected by Brenner. The
Brenner data indicate that variables
measuring teacher's evaluation of student
conduct are far more important than the
VOL. 63 NO. 2 DETERMINANTS OF INDIVIDUAL INCOMES 353
student's scholastic record in predicting
the individual's work adequacy as per-
ceived by the supervisor.
But recall that the work-related per-
sonality traits required of employees differ
according to the work role in question,
those at the base of the hierarchy requir-
ing a heavy emphasis on obedience and
rules and those at the top, where the dis-
cretionary scope is considerable, requiring
a greater ability to make decisions on the
basis of well-internalized norms. This pat-
tern is closely replicated in the social rela-
tions of schooling. Note the wide range of
choice over curriculum, life style, and
allocation of time afforded to college
students, compared with the obedience
and respect for authority expected in high
school. Differentiation occurs also within
each level of schooling. One need only to
compare the social relations of a com-
munity college with those of an elite four-
year college, or those of a working class
high school with those of a wealthy sub-
urban high school, for illustration of this
point.
The correspondence between the social
relations of production and the social rela-
tions of childhood socialization itself is not,
however, confined to schooling. There is
strong evidence for a similar correspon-
dence in the structure of family life. The
male dominated family, with its structure
of power and privilege further articulated
according to age, replicates many aspects
of the hierarchy of production in the firm.
Yet more relevant for our immediate con-
cerns here is the evidence, summarized by
Melvin Kohn, on social class, parental
values, and child-rearing practices. Kohn's
major findings are that "middle class
parents . . are more likely to emphasize
children's self-direction, and working class
parents to emphasize their conformity to
external authority.... The essential dif-
ference between the terms, as we use them,
is that self-direction focuses on internal
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standards of direction for behavior; con-
formity focuses on externally imposed
rules." Thus working-class parents value
obedience, neatness, and honesty in their
children, while higher status parents em-
phasize curiosity, self-control, and happi-
ness. Kohn concludes his statistical analy-
sis: "In this exceptionally diverse society-
deeply marked by racial and religious divi-
sion, highly varied in economy, geography,
and even degree of urbanization- social
class stands out as more important for
men's values than does any other line of
demarcation, unaffected by all the rest of
them, and apparently more important
than all of them together."
To refine the relation between social
class, values, and child-rearing, Kohn
classifies his respondents according to the
amount of "occupational self-direction"
inherent in their jobs. His analysis indi-
cates that the "relationship of social class
to parents' valuation of self-direction or
conformity for children is largely attrib-
utable to class-correlated variation in
men's exercise of self-direction in work."
The relationship of these findings to
the study of intergenerational immobility
is clear enough. Again, quoting Kohn:
Whether consciously or not, parents
tend to impart to their children lessons
derived from the conditions of life of
their own social class-and thus help
prepare their children for a similar class
position . .. Class differences in paren-
tal values and child-rearing practices in-
fluence the development of the capaci-
ties that children will someday need ...
The family, then, functions as a mecha-
nism for perpetuating inequality.
Such differential patterns of child-rear-
ing affect more than the worker's per-
sonality and aspiration level. They also
influence his or her style of self-presenta-
tion: patterns of class loyalties and modes
of speech, dress and interpersonal be-
havior.
The argument may now be summa-
354 AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION MAY 1973
rized. To get a job at any particular level
in the hierarchy of production one has to
meet two tests: first, one must be able and
willing to do the work; and second, one
must be of appropriate age, race, sex, edu-
cation, and demeanor so that one's assign-
ment to the job will contribute to the
sense that the social order of the firm is
just. Thus criteria of worker adequacy
reflect more than the employer's desire
that workers be hardworking and capable.
They reflect as well the need for acquies-
cence to the employer's monopolization of
power. The smooth exercise of control
from the top of the enterprise rests on the
daily reconfirmation of the employee's
sense of the just claim of his or her su-
periors, co-workers, and subordinates to
their particular jobs.
The ability to operate well at a par-
ticular level in the hierarchy and the legiti-
mate claim to one's place in the authority
structure and to the rewards associated
with it depend to a large extent on experi-
ences in the home and at school. The pro-
ductive enterprise is by no means a fully
articulated socialization agency capable of
shaping worker consciousness and be-
havior to its needs: its control over re-
cruitment and internal organization can
but reinforce patterns of consciousness de-
veloped in the larger society. That is, the
particular structure of authority within
the firm which will be seen as legitimate-
whether based on distinctions of race, sex,
educational credentials, age, manners of
speech, or whatever-is an expression of
broader social values and prejudices. And
these, too, are both reflected in and de-
pendent upon the structure of family life
and schooling. Specifically, I argue that a
work force which is both competent to do
the job and consistent with the perpetua-
tion of the hierarchical division of labor is
generated in large measure through a cor-
respondence between the social relations
of production on the one hand and the
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social relations of schooling and of family
life on the other. At the same time, the
corresponding relations of family life,
schooling, and work tend to reproduce
economic status differences among families
from generation to generation.
III. Conclusion
What may we conclude from this analy-
sis about the power of social reform to
reduce significantly the degree of inequal-
ity of opportunity in capitalist society?
Three main conclusions seem warranted.
First, the trivial role of the genetic in-
heritance of IQ in the intergenerational
transmission of economic status bids us
reject the pessimism of those who, like
Herrnstein, see a "virtually hereditary
meritocracy" as the fruit of successful
liberal reform in an advanced industrial
society.
Second, the fact that inequality of edu-
cational opportunity accounts for con-
siderably less than half of the correlation
between socioeconomic background and
income cautions us to question the op-
timism of those who assert that significant
progress towards equality of opportunity
can be achieved through educational re-
forms alone. Of course, progress towards
equalization of education may help to
undermine the legitimacy of income in-
equality and thus hasten the development
of stronger egalitarian movements which
in turn may have some impact on the inter-
generational transmission process (Bowles
1973). But this is hardly the argument put
forth by most proponents of egalitarian
school reforms.
Third, inequality of economic opportu-
nity is deeply rooted in the social relations
of production and their reflection in the
structure of family life and schooling. The
differing patterns of child-rearing and
other aspects of socialization faced by
children of differing social backgrounds
represent an adaptation- sometimes con-
VOL. 63 NO. 2 DETERMINANTS OF INDIVIDUAL INCOMES 355
scious, sometimes not- by parents, school
personnel, and others to the actual condi-
tions of work at the various levels of the
hierarchical division of labor. The role of
families and schools in the production of
the labor force is inescapably bound up
with a second role of these institutions:
the reproduction of economic inequality
from generation to generation.
Yet the perpetuation of economic in-
equality does not originate with the family
or the school, for the structure of home life
and of education is but a reflection of the
broader social structure. Racist, sexist,
and credentialist distinctions, and class
differences in values and modes of self-
presentation, are systematically used and
thus reinforced by employers in their ef-
forts to reproduce the hierarchical division
of labor within the enterprise. The im-
portance of these traits in the determina-
tion of individual incomes is thus not an
expression of irrational or uninformed
employment practices subject to correc-
tion by "enlightened" employment policies
and social legislation. The link between the
social relations of production and the in-
come determination process is so intimate
that any substantial change in the latter is
contingent upon the transformation of
the hierarchical division of labor as the
archetype of productive activity. Thus,
while the inheritance of tangible wealth
unquestionably contributes to the inter-
generational transmission of economic
status, the above analysis, supplemented
by evidence of significant immobility in
those socialist countries which have not
overturned the hierarchical division of
labor, suggests that the elimination of
wealth inheritance is insufficient to achieve
equality of economic opportunity.
If the above analysis is correct we are
led to one further conclusion: inequality of
opportunity and inequality itself are part
of the same process. To consider the goal
of equality of opportunity as separable
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from the goal of equality is illegitimate.
You can't have one without the other. As
long as the hierarchical division of labor
exists, you are not likely to have either.
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