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  5. Early Career Experiences: Factors Driving Initial Placements and Long-Term Outcomes
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Early Career Experiences: Factors Driving Initial Placements and Long-Term Outcomes

Paper Session

Friday, Jan. 5, 2024 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM (CST)

Convention Center, 225B
Hosted By: American Economic Association
  • Chair: Olga Shurchkov, Wellesley College

Decomposing Gender Gaps in U.S. STEM Transition from STEM Degrees to STEM Employment One Year Later

Matthew Baird
,
LinkedIn
Nikhil Gahlawat
,
LinkedIn
Rosie Hood
,
LinkedIn
Paul Ko
,
LinkedIn
Silvia Lara
,
LinkedIn

Abstract

Women are underrepresented in STEM, both in the United States and internationally. Prior literature has primarily focused on disproportionate outflows from STEM that occur during the educational process, from K-12 through college. However, the eventual goal is equitable representation within STEM jobs. We investigate millions of LinkedIn profiles in the United States to understand the transition from STEM degrees to STEM employment. We examine the large drop-off occurring between graduation and the first year of employment, which is especially severe for women, with an approximately ten percentage point widening of the gender STEM gap during this period. Using a Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition, we demonstrate that several factors impact this gap: major choice, STEM job posting views and applications, and the proportion of the local STEM workforce that are the same gender as the graduate. We estimate that if all of the measured factors were equal between men and women, women would be slightly more likely than men to persist in STEM employment.

The Intergenerational Transmission of Employers and the Earnings of Young Workers

Matthew Staiger
,
Opportunity Insights

Abstract

To what extent do connections in the labor market shape intergenerational mobility? I use employer-employee linked data to study one important type of connection: jobs obtained at a parent's employer. 29 percent of individuals work for a parent's employer at least once by age 30. Exploiting transitory and idiosyncratic variation in the availability of jobs at the parent's employer, I estimate that working for a parent's employer increases initial earnings by 19 percent. The results are attributable to parents using their connections to provide access to higher-paying firms. Individuals with higher-earning parents are more likely to work for a parent's employer and experience larger earnings gains when they do. Consequently, the elasticity of initial earnings with respect to parental earnings would be 7.2 percent lower if no one found a job through these connections. The findings raise the possibility that connections to firms through one's social network could be an important determinant of intergenerational mobility.

Reject or Revise: Gender Differences in Persistence and Publishing in Economics

Olga Shurchkov
,
Wellesley College

Abstract

We design an experiment to study gender differences in reactions to editorial decisions on submissions to top economics journals. Respondents read a hypothetical editor’s letter where the decision (e.g., revise and resubmit) is randomized across participants. Relative to an R&R, female assistant professors who receive a rejection perceive a significantly lower likelihood of subsequently publishing the paper in any leading journal than comparable male assistant professors. We do not find this gender difference among tenured professors. We consider several mechanisms, pointing to gender differences in attribution of negative feedback to ability and confidence under time constraints as likely explanations.

Discussant(s)
Melanie Wasserman
,
University of California-Los Angeles
Marlène Koffi
,
University of Toronto
Matthew Baird
,
LinkedIn
JEL Classifications
  • J2 - Demand and Supply of Labor
  • J3 - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs