We investigate how a single generation galactic mass function ( SGMF ) depends on the existence of variations in the initial stellar mass functions ( IMF ) of stellar clusters .
We show that cluster-to-cluster variations of the IMF lead to a multicomponent SGMF where each component in a given mass range can be described by a distinct power-law function .
We also show that a dispersion of \approx 0.3 M _ { \odot } in the characteristic mass of the IMF , as observed for young Galactic clusters , leads to a low mass slope of the SGMF that matches the observed Galactic stellar mass function even when the IMFs in the low mass end of individual clusters are much steeper .