Mobilité entre générations et fluidité sociale en France. Le rôle de l’éducation

Using the 1970, 1977, 1985, 1993 and 2003 Formation ? Qualification Professionnelle (INSEE) surveys, this article analyzes how intergenerational social mobility and social fluidity have evolved in France for men and women born between 1906 and 1973. It demonstrates that the statistical association between class of origin and class of destination has become weaker in recent cohorts than in older ones, and also shows that the same association diminishes with age, that is to say, along the occupational career. Finally, it demonstrates that change in education has played a key role in the process of increasing social fluidity. In the 1945-54 cohort, the reduction in inequality of educational opportunity is the main factor and the educational expansion is the secondary factor for explaining the reduction of the association between class of origin and class of destination, but the relative importance of these two factors is reversed in the 1955-64 and 1965-73 cohorts. JEL Classification : I21 ? I24 ? I26 ? J62