Why birth order could make a difference in your career prospects
Why birth order could make a difference in your career prospects
Here are some questions whose answers could tell you a lot about your career trajectory:
Are you the oldest of your siblings? The youngest? Or maybe an only child?
A growing body of economic literature shows that some siblings have better economic prospects than others — and new research reveals it’s been that way for more than a century.
“It’s good to be first,” said Siobhan O’Keefe, an economist at Davidson College who co-authored the new study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research.
The researchers scoured data from the U.S. Census Bureau going back to the mid-1800s. O’Keefe said the Census is a great way to learn about economics at the family level. “We see where you lived, who you lived with, what your occupation was, do you own the home you live in?”
Using that data, O’Keefe tracked siblings from childhood through their years in the labor force, with snapshots every 10 years.
She found that life outcomes were measurably different for older siblings.
“Firstborns end up a little bit up the job ladder,” O’Keefe said. “They make more money. They’re more likely to be in managerial or white-collar jobs.”
Other studies have found that firstborn women are less likely to have teenage pregnancies and more likely to be in the labor force. Across the board, firstborn siblings are “just always likely to be doing a little better,” O’Keefe said.
The economic advantage older siblings seem to enjoy has received its own economic jargon: the firstborn premium. It applies to only children too.
So why do firstborn siblings seem to have it so great? O’Keefe said it has to do with parental investment in the earliest years of a child’s life.
“Spending more time with caregivers — having more resources is extra, extra important,” O’Keefe said. “If I’m the first born, when I’m in that really critical development period, I’m getting 100% of my parents’ time.”
Second-born siblings get 50%, if they’re lucky. And that slice of pie gets smaller and smaller for third- and fourth-born and beyond.
Of course, many younger siblings do plenty well for themselves, so it’s important to note some caveats of this type of research.
“The first thing I always say is that this is on average,” said Sandra Black, an economics professor at Columbia University who has researched the firstborn premium and was not involved in O’Keefe’s study.
Using data from Norway, Black found that older siblings generally stayed in school longer than their younger counterparts. “Going from the first child to the fourth child would have about three-quarters of a year less of education,” Black said. “So it’s not huge, but it matters.”
O’Keefe added that, historically, the firstborn premium was more pronounced in white families than in Black families, who were excluded from some high-paying career paths altogether. “You have to be able to move up a ladder in order to have a firstborn premium.”
Research from Italy suggests the firstborn premium can be overcome, given some time. That’s because younger siblings behave differently in the job market, said Giorgio Brunello, an economist at the University of Padua. “They’re more likely to take risks, which, in the labor market, means they’re more likely to switch jobs.”
Job switching is usually a faster route to high earnings than staying put. Brunello found that younger siblings in Italy closed the earnings gap with their older counterparts about a decade into their working lives.
So while firstborn children really do have an economic leg up, Brunello has a message for all the younger siblings out there: “Don’t give up.”
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