The Intergenerational Transmission of Attitudes

Understanding persistent differences in economic performance and material well-being across countries is (and has always been) a central concern of economists and policy makers. Modern economic theories usually model economic outcomes, on the individual level as well as on the aggregate level, as the result of rational decisions made by individuals. Individuals make optimal choices given their attitudes – preferences and beliefs about the environment and the behavior of others – and also their constraints, in order to maximize their well-being or whatever their objective in life is.The potential for differences in attitudes and “culture” to explain cross-country differences in economic outcomes is a long-standing idea in political economy and sociology, as evidenced by the work of Max Weber in the early 20th Century. For conceptual and technical reasons, however, economists have traditionally concentrated on investigating the role differences in constraints play for economic outcomes.