My research expands understandings of social stratification and inequality by focusing on economic insecurity more broadly with a special emphasis on wealth, debt, and social class across different groups. Importantly, as my research shows, all groups do not have the same opportunities to accumulate wealth. Recent immigrants, people with disabilities, and Indigenous persons are all less likely to own homes and build wealth. Young adults today have also been struggling with debt, especially in the form of student loans, and many face barriers to entering the housing market. The wealth struggles of young adults and other marginalized groups are just one component of rising economic insecurity that reverberates across areas of education, employment, and housing. This situation leads into a process of cumulative advantage and disadvantage where more-advantaged groups increase their assets over time, but other less-advantaged groups either increase their debt burden, fall behind on payments, or receive no access to credit at all.
Journal Publications
Rios-Avila, Fernando and Michelle Maroto. 2022. “Moving Beyond Linear Regression: Implementing and Interpreting Quantile Regression Models with Fixed Effects.” Sociological Methods and Research, Online First *Preprint*
Maroto, Michelle. 2021. “The Great Balancing Act: Households, Debt, and Economic Insecurity.” Socius 7: 1-16.
Maroto, Michelle Lee and Bryan Sykes. 2020. “The Varying Effects of Incarceration, Conviction, and Arrest on Wealth Outcomes Among Young Adults.” Social Problems 67(4): 698-718.
Maroto, Michelle Lee and Meryn Severson. 2020. “Housing Trajectories and the Transition to Adulthood among Canadian Young Adults.” Housing Studies 35(4):679-702.
Chai, Lei and Michelle Lee Maroto. 2020. “Economic Insecurity among Sexual Minority Men: Evidence from the 1991-2016 U.S. General Social Survey.” Sociological Perspectives 63(1): 50-68.
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2019. “Sharing or Limiting the Wealth? Coresidence with Adult Children and Its Relationship with Net Worth in Canada.” Journal of Family and Economic Issues 40(1): 102-116. *Preprint*
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2018. “Sharing, Saving, or Spending? The Wealth Effects of Raising Children.” Demography 55(6): 2257-2282. *Preprint*
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2017. “When the Kids Live at Home: Coresidence, Parental Assets, and Economic Insecurity.” Journal of Marriage and Family 79(4): 1041-1059. *Preprint*
Maroto, Michelle Lee and Laura Aylsworth. 2017. “Assessing the Relationship between Gender, Household Structure, and Net Worth in the United States.” Journal of Family and Economic Issues 38:556-571.
Maroto, Michelle and Laura Aylsworth. 2016. “Catching Up or Falling Behind? Continuing Wealth Disparities for Immigrants to Canada by Region of Origin and Cohort.” Canadian Review of Sociology 53(4): 374-408.
Sykes, Bryan L., and Michelle Maroto. 2016. “A Wealth of Inequalities: Mass Incarceration, Employment, and Racial Disparities in Household Wealth, U.S. 1996-2011.” Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 2(6): 129-152.
Maroto, Michelle. 2016. “Growing Farther Apart: Racial and Ethnic Inequality in Household Wealth Across the Distribution.” Sociological Science 3: 801-824.
Maroto, Michelle. 2016. “Fifteen Years of Wealth Disparities in Canada: New Trends or Simply the Status Quo?” Canadian Public Policy 42(2): 152-167.
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2015. “Pathways into Bankruptcy: Accumulating Disadvantage and the Consequences of Adverse Life Events.” Sociological Inquiry 85(2): 183-21
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2015. “The Absorbing Status of Incarceration and Its Relationship with Wealth Accumulation.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 31(2): 207-236.
Maroto, Michelle Lee. 2012. “The Scarring Effects of Bankruptcy: Cumulative Disadvantage Across Credit and Labor Markets.” Social Forces 91(1): 99-130.
Major Grants
SSHRC Insight Development Grant (2014-2018), “Wealth Disparities across Groups in Canada and the United States: Who Gets Ahead and Who Falls Behind?” (#430-2014-00092, $63,025)
Book Chapters
Maroto, Michelle and Meryn Severson Mason. 2022. Chapter 3: Breaking Down the Wealth Equation: Housing, Assets, and Debt.” Social Inequality in Canada: Dimensions of Disadvantage, 7th Edition, edited by Monica Hwang, Edward Grabb, and Jeffrey G. Reitz. Oxford University Press.
Reports
Many of these reports are accessible through the Common Ground Initiative at the University of Alberta.
Maroto, Michelle. 2021. “Albertans and COVID-19 Vaccinations.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Maroto, Michelle. 2021. “COVID-19, Economic Insecurity, and Marginalized Groups in Alberta.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Snagovsky, Feo, and Michelle Maroto. 2021. “Ethnicity and Class: Booming in Alberta and Saskatchewan.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Maroto, Michelle. 2021. “Economic Situations and Perceptions during COVID-19 in Alberta and Saskatchewan.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Maroto, Michelle, Loleen Berdahl, and Feo Snagovsky. 2021. “Economic Perspectives and Security during COVID-19.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Maroto, Michelle and Lori Thorlakson. 2020. “Albertans’ Views on Gender: Results from the 2019 Alberta Viewpoint Survey.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Maroto, Michelle and Lori Thorlakson. 2020. “Economic Perspectives and Security in Alberta: Results from the 2019 Alberta Viewpoint Survey.” Research brief, Common Ground Research Initiative, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB.
Michelle Lee Maroto 