This paper reviews some of the econometric methods that have been used in the economics of education. The focus is on understanding how the assumptions made to justify and implement such methods relate to the underlying economic model and the interpretation of the results. We start by...

Many economists and educators of diverse political beliefs favor public support for education on the premise that a more educated electorate enhances the quality of democracy. While some earlier studies document an association between schooling and citizenship, little attempt has been made to...

U.S. educational and occupational wage differentials were exceptionally high at the dawn of the twentieth century and then decreased in several stages over the next eight decades. But starting in the early 1980s the labor market premium to skill rose sharply and by 2005 the college wage premium...

The expansion of U.S. universities after World War II gained from the arrival of immigrant scientists and graduate students, the broadening of access to universities, and the development of military research and high technology industry. Since the 1980s, however, growth of scientific research in...

This paper examines the properties of exams and markets as alternative allocation devices under borrowing constraints. Exams dominate markets in terms of matching efficiency. Whether aggregate consumption is greater under exams than under markets depends on the power of the exam technology; for...

The extent to which K-12 schools should remain open is at the forefront of discussions on long-term pandemic management. In this context, there has been little mention of the immediate importance of K-12 schooling for the rest of the economy. Eliminating in-person schooling reduces the amount of...

In this chapter, we describe the potential significance of student peer effects for the economic structure of and behavior in higher education. Their existence would motivate much of the restricted supply, student queuing, and selectivity and institutional competition via merit aid and honors...

The non-existence of credit markets implies that initial income is a determinant of who actually obtains an education. We consider the outcome of a process in which income is taxed to provide subsidies for education. and taxes are chosen by majority voting. We characterize the outcome as a...

This paper reviews a variety of estimates of the demand and supply elasticities of educated labor. It finds that elasticities of substitution between more and less educated labor range fran 1.0 to 2.0 and that elasticities of the supply of students to colleges are also on the order of 1.0 to 2.0...

This paper reviews a set of recent studies that have attempted to measure the causal effect of education on labor market earnings by using institutional features of the supply side of the education system as exogenous determinants of schooling outcomes. A simple theoretical model that highlights...