American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
Higher-Education Policies and the College Wage Premium: Cross-State Evidence from the 1990s
American Economic Review
vol. 96,
no. 4, September 2006
(pp. 959–987)
Abstract
Exploiting differences across U.S. states, this paper demonstrates that there is a tight link between higher education policies, past enrollment rates, and recent changes in the college wage premium among labor market entrants. The analysis reveals, however, that this relationship is much weaker in states with high private enrollment rates, high levels of interstate mobility, or interstate trade. The withinstate estimates of the own-cohort relative supply effect shed some light on the extent to which the U.S. labor market can be characterized as a single national market or a collection of state-specific labor markets. (JEL I21, I28, J22, J24, J31, R23)Citation
Fortin, Nicole, M. 2006. "Higher-Education Policies and the College Wage Premium: Cross-State Evidence from the 1990s." American Economic Review, 96 (4): 959–987. DOI: 10.1257/aer.96.4.959Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- I21 Analysis of Education
- I28 Education: Government Policy
- J22 Time Allocation and Labor Supply
- J24 Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
- J31 Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
- R23 Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics: Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population; Neighborhood Characteristics