The socioeconomic gap in participation at university is an enduring policy issue in South Korea, as in many other countries. However, less attention has been paid to the socioeconomic gap in the outcomes from tertiary education. This paper addresses this gap in the literature, using the Korean Education and Employment Panel (KEEP) data to…

Across Massachusetts, legislators, policymakers, educators, families, and communities are engaged in important conversations about whether to continue using student performance on the MCAS tests as part of the state's high-school graduation requirements. This document presents lessons drawn from 15-plus years of research on educational opportunity…

This dissertation contains three essays discussing government policy in higher education, the effects of online social networks during college on students after graduating, and how to use search data as a tool to recover characteristics of both products and customers to estimate demand. In the first chapter, co-authored with Shengmao Cao, we study…

Over a half century ago, researchers found that so-called classic professions attract socially advantaged recruits with better labour market outcomes; however, as semi professions become increasingly institutionalized, and classic professional programs expand, differences between these two groups may be less pronounced. Using Statistics Canada's…

Based on Swedish register data from 2003 to 2012, this study attempts to explain over-education and upward mobility among tertiary graduates. Rarely used explanatory factors are central in the analyses, such as 'still in study' and 'field of education'. Tertiary graduates in low-wage jobs are regarded as over-educated. The results of this work…

This paper examines the effects of grades from higher education on labour market outcomes. Economic theory predicts that grades are rewarded in the labour market because employers regard them as an expression of valuable skills or a signal of other sought after attributes. Social closure, however, may give reason to expect no effects. Whether good…

The persisting gender pay gap favoring men among college graduates is a puzzle given women's remarkable success in postsecondary education. This article examines income disparities among recent college graduates by intersecting gender and social class and evaluating the relative importance of fields of study and institutional selectivity.…

Students are typically given a large amount of freedom to choose the level of "curricular dispersion": the tight focus or lack thereof in the courses they elect to take while in college. There is little evidence about what predicts students' curricular dispersion, whether it affects later college or labor force outcomes, or, in fact, how…

Senior Economist Jonathan Rothwell of Gallup, presents data on employment outcomes for college graduates from different types of colleges. He also provides findings from the Gallup-USA Funds Associate Degree Graduates Survey which shows there are a number of student experiences that are highly predictive of overall life-evaluation. He cites the…

This study investigates the underrepresentation of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) occupations from the aspect of earning differentials. Using a national data source that tracked college graduates' work experiences over a ten-year time frame post-bachelor's degree, this study examines longitudinally the…

This paper assesses the impact of the mismatch between a college major and job on college graduates' early career earnings using a sample from China. On average, a major-job mismatched college graduate is found to suffer from an income loss that is much lower than the penalty documented in previous studies. The income losses are also found to be…

This study examines if the college wage premium favoring college graduates still exists. The NLSY-79 data is employed. The sample includes individuals who received their high school degree and college degree in 1980 and 1981. These individuals were followed until the year 2004. A cross sectional regression model was estimated for the years 1982,…

Nowadays, the successful transition of graduates from university into the world of work is one of the most important priorities of all involved stakeholders: governments, institutions of higher education, and individuals, as well as researchers. The present study analyzes the employability characteristics of higher technological education…

The prediction that differences in incomes of high school and college graduates will not change is tested by applying standard statistical procedures to data describing actual income differences. Data from the United States Bureau of the Census describe annual incomes of men twenty-five years old and older during 1956-75. Report 1 displays results…

A survey of 4,259 Baruch College alumni received 1,995 responses indicating that significantly more African-American business majors worked in the public sector. Best predictor of employment sector for whites was college major. African Americans who rated curricular guidance favorably and had no job offer at graduation were more likely to work in…