Sociology of Wealth
Do artists work less when handed free money? This study says no
When 2,400 New York artists received $1,000 a month with no strings attached, they spent more hours on creative work and fewer on outside jobs, even as their market earnings fell. A look at what the experiment revealed.
When the weight comes off: what GLP-1 drugs reveal about the penalty women pay for body size
A Harvard economist used the rapid uptake of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs to ask where body weight matters for women. The answer, her analysis suggests, is mostly at first impressions: new relationships and new jobs.
Big cities build adult skills but may shortchange childhoods, study finds
A new analysis of Census data finds that places good for adult careers tend to be worse for children's long-run prospects, a tradeoff tied closely to city size and how connected a community is.
Growing up rich isn’t the same as growing up wealthy: A new map of American opportunity
A new study tracking 3.4 million families finds that the geography of wealth mobility looks different from the familiar income map, with big cities showing stronger handoffs of housing wealth across generations.
Housing wealth sticks across generations more than income, study finds
A new study of 3.4 million families finds that housing wealth passes down across generations more reliably than income, with the Black-White gap widening sharply among wealthier families and much of the transfer happening outside the job market.
In Germany, kids from better-off families still grow up slightly taller
New research tracking thousands of German students finds that children from wealthier, better-educated families grow slightly faster and end up about 1.2 to 1.3 centimeters taller by age 19.
When immigration enforcement rises, childcare work moves behind closed doors
A new PNAS study finds that as ICE activity surged in 2025, foreign-born women's employment fell at regulated childcare centers and rose in private homes, reshaping where and how care gets delivered.
ICE enforcement destroyed jobs for American-born workers, new research shows
Aggressive immigration enforcement was sold as a way to put Americans back to work. But when researchers compared cities where ICE surged against those it spared, the jobs didn't appear. They vanished, for immigrants and American-born workers alike.
Does geopolitics decide where companies invest? New evidence says increasingly yes
A new study finds that political distance between countries weighs more heavily on foreign investment than a decade ago. But the friendshoring trend is mostly a Western phenomenon, and it reaches far beyond strategic industries.
The inequality warning sign: Scientists identify a key predictor of democratic decay
A cross-national study of 22 countries finds that income inequality is one of the strongest predictors of democratic erosion in the 21st century, outperforming national wealth and the age of a democracy.