Access to Microfinance for Social Mobility in Mexico

A reduction on both income and expenses among Mexican families after the confinement set during the pandemic worsened economic inequality and set higher obstacles for upward social mobility. A conceptual model is presented for a novel scheme of microcredits designed to facilitate families the acquisition of a group of durable household assets that improve the living conditions and allow the next generations to achieve a better socioeconomic status. When income data is not reliable or available, asset accumulation can be used as an estimation of household wealth and asset indexes are commonly used in the evaluation of intergenerational social mobility. Microcredits, on the other hand, are small-scale loans targeting to low-income groups widely used as part of poverty alleviation strategies. Studies have shown a positive relation between microcredits and social mobility and this model’s contribution is the link of these concepts with household assets that were not combined before. ©The author ©Springer Nature.