Journal of Labor Economics

We estimate the returns to a broad set of graduate degrees. To control for heterogeneity in preferences and ability, we use fixed effects for combinations of field-specific undergraduate and graduate degrees obtained by the last time we observe an individual. Basically, we compare earnings before the graduate degree to earnings after it. Using National Science Foundation data, we find large differences across graduate fields in earnings effects. The returns often depend on the undergraduate major. The contribution of occupational upgrading to the earnings gain varies across degrees. Finally, simple regression-based estimates of returns to graduate fields are often highly misleading.

Using data from a Canadian field experiment on financial barriers to higher education, we estimate the distribution of the value of financial aid for prospective students. We find that a considerable share of prospective students perceive significant credit constraints. Most individuals are willing to pay a sizable interest premium above the prevailing market rate for the option to take up a loan, with a median interest rate wedge equal to 6.8 percentage points for a $1,000 loan. The willingness to pay for financial aid is heterogeneous across students, with discount factors playing a key role in accounting for this variation.

This paper establishes five new facts about instructional costs in higher education using department-level data from a broad range of institutions. Costs vary widely across fields, ranging from electrical engineering (90% higher than English) to math (25% lower). This pattern is largely explained by differences in class size and faculty pay. Some STEM fields experienced steep declines in expenditures over the past 17 years, while others saw increases. Changes in class size and teaching loads alongside a shift toward contingent faculty explain these trends. Finally, the association between online instruction and instructional costs is statistically indistinguishable from zero.

We analyze the consequences of labor market quotas for the wages of women in high-level positions. Labor market quotas create uncertainty about the reason a woman is promoted. Firms know whether they promoted female employees because of the quota or their ability; their competitors do not. A winner’s curse, reducing competition for women in high-level positions, results. This widens the gender pay gap for these women. Ex ante, women are better off without quotas. Next we investigate how quotas affect incentives for employers to learn women’s abilities to make better job assignment decisions. Then, under specific conditions women may benefit.

We estimate turnover costs in small retail sales teams using daily sales data and an advance notice requirement to address endogeneity concerns. In addition to short-staffing and onboarding costs, we identify two less familiar sources of turnover costs: incumbent workers’ recruitment activities and reductions in team morale after a departure is announced. Our estimates of total turnover costs are relatively modest, however: 10% higher turnover is about as costly as a 0.6% wage increase. We attribute these low costs to a set of complementary personnel policies that ensure that only 25% of departures result in a short-staffing spell.

We analyze how the formal recognition of foreign qualifications affects immigrants’ labor market outcomes. The empirical analysis is based on a novel German data set that links respondents’ survey information to their administrative records, allowing us to observe immigrants at monthly intervals before, during, and after their application for occupational recognition. We find that 3 years after obtaining recognition, immigrants earn 19.8% higher wages and are 24.5 percentage points more likely to be employed than immigrants in the control group. We further document that occupational recognition leads to full convergence of immigrants’ earnings to those of their native counterparts.

How does school quality affect health amid multiple behavioral responses? The Rosenwald schools transformed school quality for rural southern African Americans in the early 1900s. Research shows that the schools made black migration northward more likely and that the Great Migration shortened life expectancy for these migrants. Besides the hypothesized health-enhancing effects of school quality, negative health effects might also occur through migration. We disentangle behavioral mechanisms and find complete exposure to the Rosenwald schools increased life expectancy by 2–3 months; a more naive approach finds no relationship. Results are robust to heterogeneous treatment effects and various measurement issues.

Noncognitive characteristics and personality traits can be strong predictors of economic and social outcomes of individuals. In this paper, using data on cognitive ability and psychologist-assessed “sociability” and “adaptability” linked to administrative data for the male 1932–33 birth cohort in Norway, we analyze how these three characteristics affect men’s probability to migrate across labor markets. We find that higher adaptability, the capacity to adjust to new environments and situations, and higher cognitive ability are significant predictors of the probability to migrate. Adaptability is a particularly strong migration predictor for individuals with low cognitive ability or low socioeconomic background.