Three Facts About Inequality and Equality of Opportunity

Inequality threatens equality of opportunity, but different types of inequality do so in different ways. Top-end inequality reinforces privilege, bottom-end inequality stifles upward mobility, and together they create middle class angst and insecurity. Canadians have dodged the corrosive and divisive politics that a toxic combination of higher polarization and lower mobility have enabled in the United States. In part this is because of a progressive social policy legacy. But in an era of higher inequality and wide regional differences this legacy needs to be continually reshaped to ensure opportunity and resilience for the next generation, no matter their family background or where they grow up.

Miles Corak will present three facts about the relationship between inequality and social mobility, and draw from research using big data to highlight the accomplishments of Canadian public policy, and the next set of challenges.

About our Speaker

Miles Corak is a professor of economics with The Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality at The Graduate Center, City University of New York.

His research focuses on social mobility, inequality, and child rights. His findings documenting that higher inequality is associated with lower economic opportunity have been widely cited, and used by policy-makers worldwide. The Globe and Mail, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Economist, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and the BBC have all used Corak’s research on “The Great Gatsby Curve,” as has the White House.

Dr. Corak is a graduate of McGill and Queen's Universities, has held appointments with the University of Ottawa and Statistics Canada, and has been a visiting researcher with the UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre in Florence, Italy; the Centre for Longitudinal Studies at the University of London; the Office of Population Research at Princeton University; and the Russell Sage Foundation. He was a visiting professor with the Department of Economics at Harvard University, and during 2017, served as the economist in residence with the Canadian federal government, advising the Minister of Economic and Social Development on social policy reform and the country’s poverty reduction strategy. Visit MilesCorak.com or follow him @MilesCorak.

This event is sponsored by the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy and the Environics Institute, in association with the Maytree Foundation.