What 21 billion Facebook friendships say about the economic ladder in the US

Image: Social Capital Atlas

Meta publicly released information on 21 billion Facebook friends as part of a research project looking at economic inequality in the U.S. The partnership between Meta and the researchers gives us another look at who Facebook is willing to share data with and why.

The research team wanted to know why people in certain places were more likely to move between economic brackets. The data from Meta was used by a research team to build a dataset for two studies on economic mobility. A study found that people who grow up in areas with a lot of friendship between high and low income people are more likely to move out of poverty.

Raj Chetty, a Harvard economist and lead researcher on the study, said that growing up in a community connected across class lines improves kids' outcomes and gives them a better shot at rising out of poverty.

The second study found that many places don't allow for much interaction between high and low income people. People are more likely to befriend people in similar economic brackets if a neighborhood allows for that type of interaction.

As part of an effort to understand economic inequality and the vast income disparity in the US, a group of people got access to Facebook data. Members of the research team are associated with groups that have contracts with Meta.

A sample that accounted for over 80 million people was pulled from data on users in the US who used the platform in the past 30 days, had at least 100 friends on the platform, and connected their account to their zip code. The team measured the status of users based on their location, education level, and relationship status. The analysis looked at the status of the people on Facebook.

The full dataset is available through the Data for Good program. People can use the public-facing website to find out more about the economy of their own community. The data can be downloaded for further study.

The Data for Good program is a sign of the company's willingness to partner with outside research teams and share the troves of data from its platform. It helps track how people's movement changed over time, for example.

Research into how people live their lives outside of Facebook is the main focus of openness. The company has been less willing to give data on the mental health of people who use its products.

The data from the new studies could be used to understand how people in the US build relationships. Tech giants like Meta can be used to find the data researchers need. With the help of Meta and Facebook, the companies have more control over the research questions that are asked.