Can educational institutions explain occupational choice between wage employment and entrepreneurship? This paper follows Lazear's (2005) Jack-of-all-trades hypothesis according to which an individual with a more balanced set of abilities is more likely to enter into entrepreneurship. In the...

Separate identification of the price and quantity of human capital has important implications for understanding key issues in economics. Price and quantity series are derived for four education levels. The price series are highly correlated and they exhibit a strong secular trend. Three...

Using a data set that provides information on source country employment, we examine the effect of source and host country occupational matching on earnings and the economic rate of return to the foreign human capital of immigrants in Canada. Examining occupational distributions we find that...

We combine two empirical observations in a general equilibrium occupational choice model. The first is that entrepreneurs have more control than employees over the employment of and accruals from assets, such as human capital. The second observation is that entrepreneurs enjoy higher returns to...

We examine the evolution of the returns to human capital in Canada over the period 1980-2005. Our main finding is that returns to education increased substantially for Canadian men, contrary to conclusions reached previously. Most of this rise took place in the early 1980s and since 1995....

We investigate the returns to postsecondary education relaxing the standard assumption that it proceeds in a continuous manner. Using a unique survey that collects information on a representative cohort of graduates, we are able to estimate the effects of delaying school among successful...

This paper examines the evolution of the returns to human capital in Canada over the period 1980-2006. Most of the analysis is based on Census data, and on weekly wage and salary earnings of full-time workers. Our main finding is that the returns to education increased substantially for Canadian...

This paper demonstrates that insiders can erect barriers to entry and skim rents by sinking costs in human capital when labour markets are otherwise perfectly contestable. The sunk costs nature of human capital investments may result from the need to satisfy ever increasing specialised skill...

The paper exploits the newly available Census data on the earnings of individuals in the apprenticeable trades to examine the returns to apprenticeship training. Only a small minority of males work in these trades, concentrated in the construction, production and mechanical trades where their...