Gender Differences in Completed Schooling / Kerwin Kofi Charles, Ming-Ching Luoh.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Charles, Kerwin Kofi.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Luoh, Ming-Ching.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w9028.

NBER working paper series no. w9028

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2002.

Summary:

This paper summarizes the dramatic changes in relative male-females educational attainment over the past three decades. Stock measures of education among the entire adult population show rising attainment levels for both men and women, with men enjoying an advantage in schooling levels throughout this interval. Cohort specific analysis reveals that these stock measures mask two interesting patterns: (a) gender difference at the cohort level had vanished by the early 1950 birth cohort and reversed sign ever since; (b) for several cohorts, attainment rates were flat for women and flat and falling for men. This last is puzzling in the face of the large college premia that these cohorts observed when making their schooling choices. We present a simple human capital model showing how the anticipated dispersion of future wages should affect educational investment and find that a model which includes measures of future earnings dispersion fits the data for relative schooling patterns quite well.

Notes:

Print version record

June 2002.