Achievement-related attitudes and the fate of “at-risk” groups in society

What causes poverty and how does an individual escape it? Factors such as intelligence and social class background are thought to be important. However, a number of economists have argued that an individual’s profile of achievement-related attitudes (ARAs) like work-orientation and conscientiousness might play a role in social success and failure. Part of their attraction is that these attitudes are regarded as responsive to nurturing and may be especially significant for those individuals with few formal skills to offer the labour market. The NCDS longitudinal dataset was interrogated to assess whether ARAs predicted an individual’s earnings measured almost two decades later. Results indicated that ARAs explain a good deal of variance in earnings, particularly for “at-risk” males. Social policy implications are discussed.