Recent sociological research tends to move beyond the divide between economics and sociology in the study of socioeconomic inequality. It focuses primarily on the relationship between social class and work-related income. Yet, it has been shown that wealth, rather than income, was the decisive feature of contemporary inequality and that wealth and income increasingly tend to be captured through the same households. To bridge the gap between the two disciplines and provide a comprehensive understanding of socioeconomic inequality, this article developed an integrated analysis of wealth and income distribution among occupational groups at different ages in five major European countries. To that end, we used the Household Financial and Consumption Survey [2014 wave] of the European Central Bank network.

I revisit trends in the level and distribution of income among Canadian seniors in the context of what is arguably the major source of change in these trends since the end of the seventies: the maturation of Canada's public and private earnings-related pension systems. The expanded role of earnings related pensions in the 1980s and 1990s is largely the result of changes that occurred in the 1950s and 1960s. The Canada and Quebec Pension Plans (C/QPP) were implemented in 1966 and the first cohort to receive full C/QPP benefits turned 65 in 1976. Cohorts retiring after this period were also the beneficiaries of the expansion of private occupational pensions that took place between the 1950s and the 1970s. I rely on a detailed decomposition of income by source to show that the maturation of these earnings-related programs produced not only a substantial increase in average real incomes but also a substantial reduction in income inequality among older persons, due mainly to higher C/QPP benefits. Rising real incomes went disproportionately to lower income seniors contributing to the well-known decline in low-income rates among older persons.

Past studies of aging and disability have been restricted to and by cross-sectional data. When cross-sectional surveys measure income, disability status and age at a common point in time, it is impossible to discern the process, and consequences, of a disability onset. In other words, it is not possible to examine the circumstances of the same individuals before, and after, the disability onset; nor whether effects differ according to the age at which the disability occurs. The present study uses a new panel data set, the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID), to examine the prevalence of disability with respect to age, gender, and other socio-economic characteristics; however, its unique contribution is its investigation of disability onset, and the rates of entry into, and exit from, disability status by age group and gender. Further, we assess the financial circumstances of those who become disabled vis-à-vis a “control group”.

This paper outlines a theoretical framework to think about the role of NIT on earnings inequality at a domestic level. Two main ideas inspired a growth model. First, to be connected is only meaningful for people who are already literate. Second internet, like the invention of printing, permits to increase the part of knowledge that an individual can use. The results are obtained in terms of the Lorenz criterion. The role of some key parameters is emphasized like the elasticity of substitution between talent and knowledge. Two forces are at work. On the one hand, the gap between literate and non literate people will increase. On the other hand, the incentive to become literate increases. Policy implications are derived.