Aug 08, 2022 23:00:00

If you have a ``wealthy friend'' when you were a child, your future income will likely increase

In recent years, it is

known that genetics and childhood environment greatly affect subsequent life, and various researchers are conducting research to reduce structural disparities. A new study that analyzed more than 72 million Facebook users showed that 'people who had wealthy friends as children tend to have higher future incomes.'

Social capital I: measurement and associations with economic mobility | Nature
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04996-4

Vast New Study Shows a Key to Reducing Poverty: More Friendships Between Rich and Poor - The New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/08/01/upshot/rich-poor-friendships.html

Having Wealthy Friends in Childhood Can Boost Your Income in The Future
https://www.sciencealert.com/having-rich-friends-when-you-re-young-increases-your-income-later-in-life

Researchers have long wondered whether social relationships affect income inequality and economic opportunity, but we have a large dataset that supports this hypothesis. was difficult.

Therefore, research teams such as Harvard University, Stanford University, New York University, etc. target more than 72 million Facebook users covering 84% of adults aged 25 to 44 living in the United States, more than 21 billion cases that can be confirmed on Facebook I researched relationships between friends. Researchers from Meta, which operates Facebook, also participated in the study, and the collected data included the postal code of the address, the university of origin, the model of the smartphone, the age, and other characteristics, but the name was excluded. It was said that it was.

The research team also estimated the user's income by referring to tax records and census data, and then examined where the person currently lives and how many high-income friends they have. Also, it seems that about 20 million users were able to find a link to their high school and parents. The research team analyzed what kind of friends and connections these people had at what stage of life and what were the socioeconomic trends of where they lived.

As a result of the analysis, a correlation was discovered that 'If a child born in a poor family grows up in an environment with many wealthy friends, their future income will be higher.' The research team reports that when children from poor families grow up in an environment where 70% of their friends are wealthy, their adult income tends to increase by about 20%. This correlation was stronger than factors commonly associated with future income, such as school quality, family composition, employment opportunities, and community racial composition.

The research team calls the connection of friends across socioeconomic classes 'economic connectedness'. Even in areas with similar socioeconomic conditions, income mobility was greater in areas with strong economic connectivity.

Regarding the reason why economic connectivity is related to income growth, ``Becoming friends with children from high-income families affects their future plans and gives them access to information and employment opportunities that they would not have had without friends. is obtained. Raj Chetty, lead author of the paper and an economist at Harvard University, said: 'Growing up in a community that connects across social class lines improves children's outcomes and provides a good impetus to lift them out of poverty. is obtained,” he commented.

However, this study also found that in America, rich people tend to have rich friends, and poor people tend to have poor friends. In the United States, there are many people who form friendships of the same race, and in areas where there are many poor people, there are few opportunities to make wealthy friends. It seems difficult.

Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam said, 'What America lacks today, and what it has degraded catastrophically over the last 50 years, is what I call 'bridging social capital. )”, an informal connection that connects you to people who are different from you,” he said, pointing out that building economic connectivity is a major challenge for American society.

Another study conducted by the same team found that the extent to which friendships are formed overcoming income disparities depends not only on the opportunity to contact people with different economic circumstances, but also on the willingness to make friends with people who are different from oneself. was also found to depend on In other words, simply providing housing subsidies to improve the diversity of the local population, or allowing universities and high schools to accept students from diverse economic backgrounds, may not lead to the elimination of disparities in the future. .

Professor Johannes Straubel, the author of the paper and an economist at New York University, said, ``People interested in creating economic connectivity should not only improve diversity through better school buses and affirmative action . ) We should put the same effort into interacting people with different incomes.'