Abstract:
This study is the first to examine the trends in intergenerational mobility in Vietnam via various measures focusing on earnings. To overcome the lack of long panel data resulting in life-cycle bias and measurement errors, I develop a cohort-based approach to estimate the earnings of parents based on the distribution in each cohort. This technique takes full advantage of the Vietnamese household survey data since 1992 to 2022 and allows reliable estimates of earnings mobility for rolling cohorts 1973 to 1993. The results indicate that mobility in Vietnam has declined for those born since the second half of the 1980s. This trend is characterised both by increasing intergenerational persistence and decreasing conditional rank of children, implying that children’s outcomes are more dependent on their parents’ and they have gradually less opportunity to rise as earlier cohorts. Decomposition shows that changes in the relationships between earnings and education can explain up to 84% the decreasing trend of mobility. This paper contributes to an important but less studied issue in Vietnam and can potentially inform related policies.

Abstract:
The Fourth Industrial Revolution (I.4.0) has reshaped the global landscape, emphasizing the importance of technology adoption for driving development and competitiveness. This study explores the determinants of technology adoption in the context of I.4.0 at firm levels by focusing on three main barriers: finance, human resource, and practicality. We investigate their impact on firms’ decisions to embrace advanced technologies. We examine both aggregate technology adoption measures and individual technology adoption patterns, providing a nuanced understanding. Our findings reveal that financial capacity does not significantly influence adoption decisions, while human resource barriers play a vital role, highlighting the significance of developing digital skills in the workforce. Moreover, firms’ perceptions of technology practicality positively correlate with higher adoption levels. This research contributes valuable insights to the ongoing discourse on technology adoption in the digital age, with implications for policymakers and firms seeking to harness the transformative potential of I.4.0 technologies in pursuit of sustainable growth and competitiveness.