• mobility
• persistence
• education
• graduates
• Italy

The aim of this study is to assess social mobility among Italian graduates in terms of how likely is it that when parents hold a university degree, their offspring will also graduate? The methodology that has been chosen involves the use of rare surnames and of historical data (1861-2010) from Center and Northern Italy Universities. A panel data analysis of the dataset thus created yields a social mobility index between 0.4 and 0.5, meaning that 4 generations on average need to pass before someone with graduate ancestors has the same chance of graduating as someone who does not descend from graduates.