Inequality of Educational Returns in France. Some Evidence of Change in the Relative Importance of the Effect of Education and Social Background on Occupational Careers

This paper is an extended version of the chapter about France within the comparative volume edited by F. Bernardi and G. Ballarino (2016), Education, Occupation and Social Origin. A Comparative Analysis of the Transmission of Socio-Economic Inequalities, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Publishing. On the basis of the 1977, 1985, 1993 and 2003 Formation & Qualification Professionnelle surveys and various indicators of labour market success, it establishes three main results: (1) after controlling for education, there still exists a ‘direct’ effect of class origin on labour market success which is visible more at an advanced stage of the occupational career than at its outset; (2) this ‘direct’ origin effect varies in strength over educational categories, being weaker or non-existent among the higher educated, i.e., a higher social background is to a certain extent able to compensate for less prominent educational assets; (3) the ‘direct’ origin effect has strengthened in the recent cohorts or the last decade observed.