Economic positions of individuals change over time due to several reasons in a society, such as their participation in economic activity, improvement in education, occupation progression and geographical movement. The analyses of societal stratification based on income or socio economic variables ignore the reshuffling of individuals in the socio economic distribution over time and this transformation/mobility on different domain is an important aspect which needs to be addressed. There is a distinction between intra generational and intra-temporal socio economic mobility as an organizational device, reflecting the structure of society. Socioeconomic mobility is the ability of an individual, family or some other groups to improve their socio-economic status in respect of education, occupation prestige and income.

The academicians are more concerned about upward mobility and reduction in long-term inequality and they have given much emphasis to income inequality in the debate related to income inequality. They regarded income mobility an important complement to measure the extent of income inequality. This study is an attempt to explore the factors responsible for upward mobility of household through developing a model for analysis purpose. The significance of this study is to fill the research gap by identifying the factors responsible for intra temporal and intra generational mobility. The results of the study will be helpful for the policy makers and academicians to understand the important aspect of our society in relation to the upward transformation of the households. In spite of the rich literature, this study has its own significance for the public sector to formulate the appropriate policies because it provides micro level picture about upward transformation of the households of central Punjab, Pakistan.

The study proceeds as follows:

In section II discussion regarding the studies related to the stratification process, socio economic factors, and mobility analysis is presented. Theoretical framework, data methodology are presented in section III. Section IV presents the results of stratification, household mobility, consequences of mobility in terms of change in economic wellbeing and the last section concludes.

A lot of literature is available regarding the measurement of socio economic stratification and its relationship with mobility and these studies have given emphasis to different factors like mobility, socioeconomic stratification. Fields and Freiji (2007) review a large array of results on mobility about Latin America with the help of different mobility concepts, databases, and methodologies. The results of the study indicate that income mobility is not the same as inequality changes. The studies on mobility expose different pattern and processes than the changes in inequality and rising inequality is well matched with mobility. The study points out that a convergence between high and low earners is initiated when initial reported earnings are used. Fields and Cichello (2003) used linear and non-parametric regression models for Venezuela to measure the extent of income mobility. They find a significant and negative relationship when they used reported initial income, but they failed to find a significant relationship when predicted initial income was used in the analysis.

Fields and Hernandez (2007) conducted a survey based study for three countries namely Argentina, Mexico and Venezuela. In each country they took sample of male and female workers from labor force and in a follow up survey one year later. The objective of their study was to analyze the impact of base year reported earnings, longer term earning, gender, age, education and geographic region on changes in earnings from base year to final year. In order to capture earning changes among workers and to exclude new entrants and retirees the study limits the analysis to individual between the age of 25 and 60 years in base year. The study concludes that earnings mobility is more frequent in all the three countries.

Delorenzi (2006) discusses the geographical mobility mediated by people’s social position, depending on a range of characteristics. The study points out that individuals face obstacles in the way of movement from backward areas to the developed one. The study stresses that geographical mobility in the UK is easier than other European countries. Murphy (2006) points out that two- earners households have been increasing over time for the last two decades. Weitoft et al (2004) are of opinion that the single parent children show poor educational performance due to non-availability of sufficient resources. Blanden et al., (2005) bring up that education is one of the significant variables in?uencing relative social mobility. They show that there exists a relationship between educational attainment and income mobility.

This study is based on survey directed to the households of three districts (Lahore, Sheikhupura and Chiniot) for measuring their socioeconomic status. The respondents are from working class and are in between the age of 45 and 65 years. The study considers 2000 as a base year and 2017 as a final year. The study uses random sampling technique for the purpose of data collection. The details of district wise sample is shown in Table 1.

Intra-Generational Mobility, ( - ).

Inactive Occupation Position of Labor Market:

It divides the households into five socio-economic strata on the basis of base year household occupation earning generated by head of the household only. This domain is considered to be the origins point of socioeconomic status index (SESI) of the household because the economic cycle of this domain is 20 year back from the current period, the year of 2000 has been taken as reference point of analysis or considered as base year observation for socio-economic period.

Active Occupation Position of Labor Market:

It categorizes the household on the basis of total household occupation earning generated by head of household till the time of face to face interview. This domain is to be considered the peak occupation position in terms of income or socioeconomic position of the household and taken as intra generational mobility of household due to the head of household cognitive ability in labor market.

Intra-Temporal Household Mobility, ( - )

Intra-generational transformation describes the scenario about socio economic transformation of household on the basis of head of household intellectual ability and expertise. The question arises whether the household transformation is occurred only due to head of household socio economic factors or it has occurred as a result of other household member’s socio economic participation. For this purpose, the present study shifts the intra-generational transformation toward intra-temporal household mobility which indicates how much household transformation has occurred during twenty year economic cycle due to collective occupation earning in labor market relative to the base year or a combination of other socio economic factors. This study measures two types of transformation trend with same base year domain

Collective Household Earning in Labor Market:

This domain divides the household into five socio-economic strata on the basis of their total income including head of household income at the time of interview. This domain is considered the destination point of SESI of the household and has been taken as measure of the extent of household’s mobility from base year to final year due to participation of all earning hands in occupation market.

The Model

= + + + .

Table 2. List of Variables Included in Model

Quantitative Analysis of Mobility Pattern.

Table 3 highlights the size of strata after the mobility in terms of more or less leakage and inject transformation.

Table 3. Intra-Generational and Intra-Temporal Household Mobility in Central Punjab

Source: Author Calculation from the Survey Data, 2018

The most benefited group due to intra-temporal household mobility/transformation is survivors/active occupation and struggling group during a 20 year economic cycle. This indicates that the households of the Central Punjab have potentials to provide the socio economic benefits to middle strata and has to take the society on the path of convergence because there is more chances to equal distribution of socio economic resources from rich to poor. In case of intra-generational mobility, the head of the households need not to have extraordinary potentials to replace their position in hierarchy with more education and high living standard.

Table 4. Contribution of Factors in Upward Mobility in Urban and Rural Regions of Central Punjab

Source: Author’s Calculation

The analysis presented in Table 4 suggests that several factors contribute in household upward mobility as their coefficients are statistically significant. In Central Punjab, improvement of education of head of household and other household members as well as occupation progression have positive relationship with upward household transformation which means educated head of household and other members are more likely to experience chances of upward transformation because their education is working as a transmission which convert their skills and knowledge in occupation progress and helps in raising their income level. Similar result about the positive relationship between education improvement and upward transformation are also found by (Miliband, 2003; Delorenzi et al. 2005; Machin, 2004; Blanden et al. 2005).

Considering the education level of other household members it has been observed that it is positively related to transformation process and is also statistically significant. The probability of upward transformation increases if household member (including children, women and head of household) is educated by 14.5% in urban Central Punjab. These results are consistent with the finding of on this ground, (Connor & Dewson, 2001) and (Forsyth & Furlong, 2003). But this relationship is insignificant in rural Central Punjab where, education backwardness still exists. After countersigning many international agreements on the right of education, Pakistan has made effective progress in near past on the provision of education especially in rural and remote areas but still more than 50% school are without basic facility and the quality of education and education system is still questionable (Qamar, 2014).

Socio economic factors and their influence on intra- temporal mobility on the basis of literature and econometric techniques conclude that education plays a significant role in socioeconomic origins and destination years. In Central Punjab, the opportunities of education and occupations have served as a bridge to increase household income level and socio economic status. It can be concluded that in Central Punjab, household plunge themselves into the availability of opportunity of life chances. However, some factors reduce the significance of education and occupation progression together to address inequalities and lack of chances of socio economic transformation for working/struggling class. In order to improve the situation there is a need to have trickledown effect of labor market from ruler toward struggling and working strata.

The urban areas of Central Punjab provides better opportunities to the household which helps them to improve their socioeconomic status as compare to rural areas. This calls for appropriate steps to improve the economic and social infrastructure of society in remote area of each part of Central Punjab. For addressing these issues concrete measures are needed that can satisfy the unmet needs of every individual of society. This mechanism demands to make sure that both public and private sectors provide equal service structure in labor market to the individuals according to their capabilities and knowledge. Moreover, government should initiate socio economic project focusing on the reduction of poverty and other issues related to household stratification gap.

The present study tries to analyze the relationship between socioeconomic stratification, intra temporal and intra generational mobility in three districts of Central Punjab. The study does not throw light on the distribution of long term income due to mobility and its impact on consumption pattern of the household. It is left on the future researchers to conduct research on the above mentioned aspect. This will help the policymakers to formulate and implement policies to reduce the extent of poverty and inequality in Central Punjab. ?