IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/palcom/v9y2022i1d10.1057_s41599-022-01280-8.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

People in the United States judge the success of individuals from higher- versus lower-income families as less deserving

Author

Listed:
  • Benedikt Schnurr

    (Technical University of Munich, TUM School of Management)

Abstract

Extant research demonstrates that individuals from higher-income families are more likely to become successful than individuals from lower-income families. This research aims at investigating how deserving people judge the same socioeconomic success when that success is achieved by individuals from higher- versus lower-income families. Building on the literature suggesting that people draw diverse inferences about others based on their socioeconomic status, seven preregistered experiments, conducted among participants from the United States, demonstrate that people deem the same socioeconomic success of an individual as less deserving when that individual comes from a higher- versus lower-income family. This difference in success deservingness judgments occurs because, in accomplishing the same success, people judge individuals from higher- versus lower-income families as less self-reliant, even when success can be attributed to individuals’ own effort. Importantly, this discrepancy in judgments of self-reliance and success deservingness has critical behavioral consequences: people prefer to give less support to individuals from higher- versus lower-income families, even when these individuals have experienced the same economic downturn and have accomplished the same career success. Together, these results extend existing research on the consequences of social class stereotypes for individuals and society, contribute to the philosophical and socio-political discourse about the nature of deservingness, and caution against a potentially biased provision of support based on people’s family background.

Suggested Citation

  • Benedikt Schnurr, 2022. "People in the United States judge the success of individuals from higher- versus lower-income families as less deserving," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-8, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:9:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-022-01280-8
    DOI: 10.1057/s41599-022-01280-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41599-022-01280-8
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s41599-022-01280-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alberto Alesina & Stefanie Stantcheva & Edoardo Teso, 2018. "Intergenerational Mobility and Preferences for Redistribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(2), pages 521-554, February.
    2. Rainer Zitelmann, 2020. "Upward classism: Prejudice and stereotyping against the wealthy," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(2), pages 162-179, June.
    3. Serena F. Hagerty & Kate Barasz, 2020. "Inequality in socially permissible consumption," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 117(25), pages 14084-14093, June.
    4. Nicholas W Papageorge & Kevin Thom, 2020. "Genes, Education, and Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from the Health and Retirement Study," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 18(3), pages 1351-1399.
    5. Lisa Feeney & George H. Haines & Allan L. Riding, 1999. "Private investors' investment criteria: Insights from qualitative data," Venture Capital, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(2), pages 121-145, April.
    6. Isabella Grabner & Frank Moers, 2013. "Managers' Choices of Performance Measures in Promotion Decisions: An Analysis of Alternative Job Assignments," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(5), pages 1187-1220, December.
    7. Hazel Rose Markus & Barry Schwartz, 2010. "Does Choice Mean Freedom and Well-Being?," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 37(2), pages 344-355, August.
    8. Christopher, Andrew N. & Schlenker, Barry R., 2000. "The impact of perceived material wealth and perceiver personality on first impressions," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 1-19, February.
    9. Tobias Schlager & Ashley V. Whillans, 2022. "People underestimate the probability of contracting the coronavirus from friends," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-11, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sheikh Raheel Manzoor & Atif Ullah & Rezwan Ullah & Afraseyab Khattak & Heesup Han & Sunghoon Yoo, 2023. "Micro CSR intervention towards employee behavioral and attitudinal outcomes: a parallel mediation model," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 10(1), pages 1-14, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrea Pogliano, 2024. "Born That Way: Beliefs about Genetics’ Importance and Redistribution Preferences," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 24-017/I, Tinbergen Institute.
    2. Rodríguez Chatruc, Marisol & Rozo, Sandra, 2021. "How Does it Feel to Be Part of the Minority?: Impacts of Perspective Taking on Prosocial Behavior," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 11599, Inter-American Development Bank.
    3. Tim Krieger & Christine Meemann & Stefan Traub, 2022. "Inequality, Life Expectancy, and the Intragenerational Redistribution Puzzle - Some Experimental Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 9677, CESifo.
    4. Neidhöfer, Guido & Serrano, Joaquín & Gasparini, Leonardo, 2018. "Educational inequality and intergenerational mobility in Latin America: A new database," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 329-349.
    5. Ingar Haaland & Christopher Roth & Johannes Wohlfart, 2023. "Designing Information Provision Experiments," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 61(1), pages 3-40, March.
    6. Alberto Alesina & Elie Murard & Hillel Rapoport, 2019. "Immigration and Preferences for Redistribution in Europe," Working Papers 2019-15, CEPII research center.
    7. Cars Hommes & Julien Pinter & Isabelle Salle, 2023. "What People Believe about Monetary Finance and What We Can(‘t) Do about It: Evidence from a Large-Scale, Multi-Country Survey Experiment," CESifo Working Paper Series 10574, CESifo.
    8. Javier Olivera & Philippe Kerm, 2022. "Public support for tax policies in COVID-19 times: evidence from Luxembourg," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(6), pages 1395-1418, December.
    9. Alberto Alesina & Marlon Seror & David Y. Yang & Yang You & Weihong Zeng, 2020. "Persistence through Revolutions," Working Papers DT/2020/09, DIAL (Développement, Institutions et Mondialisation).
    10. Lasse J. Jessen & Sebastian Koehne & Patrick Nüß & Jens Ruhose, 2024. "Socioeconomic Inequality in Life Expectancy: Perception and Policy Demand," CESifo Working Paper Series 10940, CESifo.
    11. Enea Baselgia & Isabel Z. Martínez, 2024. "Using Rich Lists to Study the Super-Rich and Top Wealth Inequality: Insights from Switzerland," CESifo Working Paper Series 10993, CESifo.
    12. Bellani, Luna & Berriochoa, Kattalina & Kapteina, Mark & Schwerdt, Guido, 2024. "Information Provision and Support for Inheritance Taxation: Evidence from a Representative Survey Experiment in Germany," IZA Discussion Papers 17099, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Klockmann, Victor & von Schenk, Alicia & Villeval, Marie Claire, 2022. "Artificial intelligence, ethics, and intergenerational responsibility," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 203(C), pages 284-317.
    14. Burgstaller, Lilith & Feld, Lars P. & Pfeil, Katharina, 2022. "Working in the shadow: Survey techniques for measuring and explaining undeclared work," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 661-671.
    15. Lobeck, Max & Morten.Stostad@nhh.no, Morten Nyborg, 2023. "The Consequences of Inequality: Beliefs and Redistributive Preferences," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 17/2023, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    16. Laméris, Maite D. & Garretsen, Harry & Jong-A-Pin, Richard, 2020. "Political ideology and the intragenerational prospect of upward mobility," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    17. Barton, Jared & Pan, Xiaofei, 2022. "Movin’ on up? A survey experiment on mobility enhancing policies," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    18. Francis Wong, 2024. "Taxing Homeowners Who Won’t Borrow," CESifo Working Paper Series 11185, CESifo.
    19. Lars Osberg, 2019. "Could "Equality of Opportunity" among Commoners Suffice?," Working Papers daleconwp2019-01, Dalhousie University, Department of Economics.
    20. Mijs, Jonathan Jan Benjamin, 2019. "The Paradox of Inequality: Income Inequality and Belief in Meritocracy go Hand in Hand," SocArXiv dcr9b, Center for Open Science.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:9:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-022-01280-8. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.nature.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.