Assortative Mating, Income Inequality, and Place

There is a growing concern internationally about levels of income inequality, and the negative effect this has on the functioning of societies both in terms of productivity and social harmony. An unexpected contributor to inequality is assortative mating - the phenomenon of “like marrying like”. Educational attainment is highly correlated with income; when two highly educated people partner and form a household they are more likely to appear at the top of the household income distribution, while couples with only primary or incomplete secondary education appear at the bottom. Therefore the greater the propensity to mate assortatively the more unequal the distribution of household income becomes. I ask two questions of the relationship between educational assortative mating and household income inequality. Firstly, how do countries (in Europe) differ in their degree of educational assortative mating? Secondly, what is the evidence that such differences are reflected in indicators of household income inequality? My study differs from the prevailing approaches to this question by taking a geographical approach. Instead of comparing a single country over time and monitoring the correspondence between assortative mating and income inequality, I compare a wide range of countries, using a uniform instrument, at one point in time. In order to do so I draw on the unit records of 29 countries from the European Social Survey administered in 2012. From these unit record data I have been able to identify two important patterns. Firstly, there is a clear presence of educational assortative mating in each country. However, the degree differs and it does so primarily as a reflection of the overall level of education in the country. Rising levels of education lower the returns for education, in turn making assortative mating comparatively less attractive. As a result, the level of assortative mating, compared to what would be expected under random conditions, is lower in highly educated nations. The lowered level of assortative mating in highly educated nations reduces the barriers to social mobility through marriage for those without university educations. Consequently, household income inequality is seen to be intrinsically related to assortative mating, although the outcomes can be mitigated by redistribution policies.