Intragenerational occupational mobility of South Korea, 1998–2017: Implications of the gendered life course approach for mobility and inequality studies

초록

This study examined intragenerational mobility in South Korea during the era of increasing inequality by applying a micro-class approach. We improved the methods of studying intragenerational mobility by accounting for non-employment and analyzing gendered age patterns of intragenerational mobility based on a synthetic cohort approach. Our analyses demonstrated the following. First, age patterns of intragenerational mobility greatly differed by gender: Men's mobility patterns stabilized as they aged, but there was no such stabilization among women. Notably, movements in and out of labor markets were more frequent among women than men. The persistence of patriarchal culture during rapid economic development was responsible for this pattern. Second, intragenerational mobility did not increase in South Korea. This finding is different from that of the United States, where increasing intragenerational mobility partly countervailed the trends of rising inequality for stable intergenerational mobility. This difference warrants reconsidering the role of intragenerational mobility as a link between inequality and social mobility. We discuss the implications of these findings on the relationship between inequality and mobility and gendered life trajectories in South Korea. © 2021 Elsevier Ltd

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