Upward social mobility and life satisfaction: the cases of United Kingdom and Switzerland

in Longitudinal and Life Course Studies (2015), 6(3), 13-14

Status is a major determinant of subjective well-being (SWB). This is one of the primary assumptions of social production function theory. In contrast, the dissociative hypothesis holds that upward social ... [more ▼]

Status is a major determinant of subjective well-being (SWB). This is one of the primary assumptions of social production function theory. In contrast, the dissociative hypothesis holds that upward social mobility may be linked to identity problems, cognitive distress, and reduced levels of SWB because of lost ties to one’s class of origin. In our paper, we use panel data from the United Kingdom (British Household Panel Survey) and Switzerland (Swiss Household Panel) to test these hypotheses. These two countries are compared because historically, social inequality and upward mobility have played distinct roles in each country’s popular discourse. We conduct longitudinal multilevel analyses to gauge the effects of intragenerational and intergenerational upward mobility on life satisfaction (as a cognitive component of SWB), controlling for previous levels of life satisfaction, dynamic class membership, and well-researched determinants of SWB such as age and health problems. Our results provide some evidence for effects of social class and social mobility on well-being in the UK sample, however, there are no such effects in the Swiss sample. The UK findings support the idea of dissociative effects, that is, intergenerational upward mobility is negatively associated with SWB. [less ▲]

Urban Air Makes Who Free? Immigration and Urban Citizenship in Contemporary Europe

in Pauly, Michel; Lee, Alexander (Eds.) Urban liberties and citizenship from the Middle Ages up to now (2015)

Urban densities and patterns: stylized facts and generic abstract tools

Conference given outside the academic context (2019)

Urban Ecology. Definitions and Concepts

in LANGNER, Marcel; ENDLICHER, Wilfried (Eds.) Shrinking Cities: Effects on Urban Ecology and Challenges for Urban Development. (2007)

The urban horse: Equestrian Traffic and Horse Husbandry in Late Medieval Cities

Scientific Conference (2015, March 19)

Just like cattle, sheep and pigs, horses were part of the still agrarian influenced late medieval townscapes. Written and iconographic sources as well as archaeological evidence give proof of the ... [more ▼]

Just like cattle, sheep and pigs, horses were part of the still agrarian influenced late medieval townscapes. Written and iconographic sources as well as archaeological evidence give proof of the extensive presence of horses inside and outside the city walls and their indispensability for urban and interurban communication and mobility. Since the thriving of European cities in the High Middle Ages, there was an increasing demand for faster and more reliable exchange services comparable with those in the Roman Empire: after the decline of the well-developed and regularly maintained Roman road network, circulation of people, goods and services had become less effective, particularly given that carriage traffic was virtually impossible on deteriorated roads. Consequently, equestrian traffic gained more importance in the medieval period, as much in long-distance travels as in shorter day’s journeys. In order to facilitate urban mobility and communication between cities, traffic policies were developed, which consisted of road works, institutionally controlled mounted courier services and provision of courier horses, as well as travel allowances and travel horses for hire. In addition, the authorities adopted decrees which regulated animal waste disposal and corpse removal to guarantee a hygienic living environment for both humans and animals. At the same time specialized systems and structures for urban horse husbandry arose, e. g. stables for mounts of the city authorities and distinguished guests; on the other side, horse rental stations for the middle class emerged in the late 15th century. [less ▲]

Urban Interactions

E-print/Working paper (2017)

This paper studies social-tie formation when individuals care about the geographical location of other individuals. In our model, the intensity of social interactions can be chosen at the same time as ... [more ▼]

This paper studies social-tie formation when individuals care about the geographical location of other individuals. In our model, the intensity of social interactions can be chosen at the same time as friends. We characterize the equilibrium in terms of both social interactions and social capital (the value of social interactions offered by each agent) for a general distribution of individuals in the urban geographical space. We show that greater geographical dispersion decreases the incentives to socially interact. We also show that the equilibrium frequency of interactions is lower than the effcient one. Using a unique geo-coded dataset of friendship networks among adolescents in the United States, we estimate the model and validate that agents interact less than the social first best optimum. Our policy analysis suggests that, given the same cost, subsidizing social interactions yields a higher total welfare than subsidizing transportation costs. [less ▲]

Urban liberties and citizenship from the Middle Ages up to now

Book published by Porta Alba Verlag (2015)

Actes du colloque 2009 de la Commission internationale pour l'Histoire des villes

Urban Networks on the Move

in German Cities - Success Beyond Growth? (2006)

Urban Policy in the Time of Obama

in DISP Dokumente und Informationen zur Schweizerischen Orts-, Regional- und Landesplanung (2018), 54(212/1), 76

Urban Space and Logistics. On the road to Sustainability?

in World Transport Policy & Practice (1995), 1(1), 39-45