A key empirical contribution is our new census panel (1850–1950)— leveraging historical admin. data to include women despite name changes. It is the most representative census panel available & comprises 186,000,000 linked records.

Now publicly available: github.com/lukasalthoff...

Income mobility rose in tandem with human capital mobility over this period. This rise in income mobility is also uniquely accounted for by the changing role of maternal human capital.

Before mass schooling, mothers were children's primary educators at home. Schooling reduced dependence on maternal human capital, previously the most important predictor of children's outcomes.

Causal evidence from mandatory schooling laws support this conclusion.

How did the US become a land of opportunity? In a new paper, we show that the country's pioneering role in mass education was key to its rise in intergenerational mobility from 1850 to 1950.

"America's Rise in Human Capital Mobility"
with Harriet Brookes Gray & Hugo Reichardt