The book is a study of intergenerational class mobility and the process of socioeconomic status attainment in contemporary Japan. The idea of "Japan as an educational credential society" has been debated for a long time in Japan. The book empirically evaluates this idea within the framework of a cross-national comparison with the United States and Britain.

The author also examines the patterns of class mobility in Japan within a cross-national perspective and reports similarities and differences in the mobility patterns among the three societies.