Childhood poverty increases the likelihood of adult poverty. However, past research offers conflicting accounts of cross-national variation in the strength of—and mechanisms underpinning—the intergenerational persistence of poverty. Here the authors investigate differences in intergenerational poverty in the United States, Australia, Denmark, Germany and the United Kingdom using administrative- and survey-based panel datasets. Intergenerational poverty is decomposed into family background effects, mediation effects, tax and transfer insurance effects and a residual poverty penalty. The intergenerational persistence of poverty is 0.43 in the United States (95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.40–0.46; P < 0.001), compared with 0.16 in the United Kingdom (95% CI = 0.07–0.25; P < 0.001) and 0.08 in Denmark (95% CI = 0.08–0.08; P < 0.001). The US disadvantage is not channelled through family background, mediators, neighbourhood effects or racial or ethnic discrimination. Instead, the United States has comparatively weak tax and transfer insurance effects and a more severe residual poverty penalty. If the United States were to adopt the tax and transfer insurance effects of its peer countries, its intergenerational poverty persistence could decrease by more than one-third.

儿童贫困会增加成年后贫困的可能性。然而，过去的研究对贫困的代际持续性强度和支撑机制的跨国差异提供了相互矛盾的解释。在这里，作者使用基于行政和调查的面板数据集调查了美国、澳大利亚、丹麦、德国和英国代际贫困的差异。代际贫困被分解为家庭背景效应、中介效应、税收和转移保险效应以及残余贫困惩罚。在美国，贫困的代际持续性为 0.43 （95% 置信区间 （CI） = 0.40-0.46;P < 0.001），而英国为 0.16 （95% CI = 0.07–0.25;P < 0.001） 和丹麦 0.08 （95% CI = 0.08–0.08;P < 0.001）。美国的劣势不是通过家庭背景、调解人、邻里影响或种族或民族歧视来引导的。相反，美国的税收和转移保险效应相对较弱，剩余贫困惩罚更严重。如果美国采用其同行国家的税收和转移保险效应，其代际贫困的持续性可能会减少三分之一以上。