Study: La. trails U.S. for upward economic mobility, leads in downward mobility

A new study by the Pew Research Center’s Economic Mobility Project says Louisiana is among three states in which its residents are most likely to move down the earnings ladder and least likely to ascend it. The “Economic Mobility of the States” study evaluates economic mobility in three ways, including absolute mobility—a measurement of residents’ average earnings growth over time—as well as upward and downward relative mobility, or the measurement of a person’s rank on the ladder relative to their peers. In all three categories Louisiana had worse mobility than the U.S. average. The only two other states in which this was true are Oklahoma and South Carolina. The South in general performed dismally in the study. Of the nine states consistently showing lower upward mobility and higher downward mobility, all are in the South. Eight states, primarily in the Mideast and New England regions, have higher upward mobility and lower downward mobility compared to the national average. Most every other state fared about average compared to the United States at large. “When it comes to achieving the American Dream, it matters where you live,” says Erin Currier, project manager of Pew’s Economic Mobility Project. Geographic mobility—whether people born in a particular state stayed there or moved elsewhere—was not shown to drive overall state differences in economic mobility. But individual mobility—that is, those who moved out of their birth states—had better outcomes on average than those who did not. See the full study, an interactive map and more details at the Pew website here.