1 Introduction

View the most recent version.

The schooling of immigrant children is often cited as an important outcome related to their capacities to succeed in the labour market. The objective of our research is to inform this discussion by focusing on the education outcomes of the children of immigrants. The analysis is based upon the Canadian experience. Our frame of reference is a growing literature on intergenerational mobility of earnings and education that has come to complement the large number of studies on the social and economic position of immigrants. This literature examines the strength of the tie between the situation of immigrants and the adult outcomes of their children, the so-called 'second generation.' For example, Borjas (1992, 1993), Card, DiNardo and Estes (2000) and Card (2005) examine both the education and earnings outcomes of the children of immigrants born in the United States, and in particular on how well they do relative both to their parents and to children whose parents were also born in the United States. Similar issues have also been studied in Europe including, among others: Van Ours and Veenman (2003) for the Netherlands; Hammarstedt and Palme (2006), Osterberg (2000), Rooth and Ekberg (2003) for Sweden; Nielson et al. (2003) for Denmark; Bauer and Riphahn (2007) for Switzerland; Dustmann and Theodoropoulos (2006) for Britain; and Gang and Zimmerman (2000), Riphan (2002, 2003), and Fertig and Schmidt (2002) for Germany. Canada is often held up as an international success story in terms of the well-being of immigrants, yet to the best of our knowledge there are no Canadian-based studies of this sort. Soroka, Johnston and Banting (2007), and Reitz and Banerjee (2007) study aspects of intergenerational dynamics in Canada other than education, but the analysis we pursue using Canadian data is probably closest in spirit to Aydemir, Chen and Corak (forthcoming) who examine the intergenerational earnings mobility of immigrants to Canada.

We ask three questions that are relevant to the discussion concerning the well-being of the children of immigrants. First, what is the degree of intergenerational education mobility, and is it different among immigrants and their children? Second, what factors are most tightly related to the schooling outcomes of second-generation Canadians, parental earnings or parental education? And third, has the strength of the tie between the education of immigrant parents and their Canadian-born children changed over time?

The answers to these questions will help to shed light on the concern that the current economic situation of recent immigrants has strong implications for the next generation. The relative decline in the economic status of immigrants, particularly recent immigrants, has been well documented in Canada, as for example in Aydemir and Skuterud (2005), Baker and Benjamin (1994), Bloom, Grenier and Gunderson (1995), Frenette and Morissette (2003), Grant (1999), and Hou and Picot (2003). If money matters a great deal in determining the ultimate educational attainment of their children, it may also matter for their long-run economic well-being and the extent to which they can participate in the Canadian labour market.