Social inequality in work-family life courses

Anette Fasang presents Equal Lives project findings at Berlin workshop

Equal Lives co-Principal Investigator Anette Fasang presented new findings from the Equal Lives project at a at the Berlin Social Science Centre workshop on Demography and Inequality.

Her presentation, Social Inequality in Work-Family Life Courses in Five European Societies shared details of cross country comparative research examining life course as a marker of social inequality.

The research looks at how welfare states shape life courses including those of the least well off, whether socio-economically advantaged young adults in different countries have similar life courses and which welfare states can claim equal lives for men and women.

The research, which looks at the life courses of more than 20,000 young adults in Denmark, Finland, the UK, East Germany and West Germany used innovative methods to compare their socio-economic and family trajectories.

Findings from the work indicate that the most well off young adults end up experiencing relatively normative family and work lives and that the advantages they have persist and indeed accumulate over time. They also show that men in all countries are far more likely to experience the most privileged life courses.