College graduates tend to earn more than non-graduates but it is difficult to ascertain how much of this empirical association between wages and college degree is due to the causal effect of a college degree and how much is due to unobserved factors that influence both wages and education (e.g....

We consider the effects of student ability, college quality, and the interaction between the two on academic outcomes and future earnings. Both ability and college quality strongly improve outcomes and earnings. We find little evidence to support the "mismatch" hypothesis that college quality...

This paper studies how a student's ordinal rank in a peer group affects performance and specialisation choices in university. By exploiting data with repeated random assignment of students to teaching sections, we find that a higher rank increases performance and the probability of choosing...

This paper establishes that the rise in employer-provided training due to technological change has dampened the college wage premium. Using unique survey micro-data, I show that hightechnology firms provide more training overall, but the gap in training participation between high- and low-skill...

By using unique web-survey data, this paper assesses the gender wage gap in Polish academia. We conduct a detailed study of the gender gap considering monthly salaries and reservation wages. The study involves regression analysis, Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition of mean wage differentials and...

In recent years there has been a plethora of empirical papers by economists concerning the effects of academic rank in school or college on subsequent outcomes of students. We review this recent literature, describing the difficult identification and measurement issues, the assumptions and...

This paper provides a theoretical rationale for private investment in basic research. It explains the decision by some firms to hire scientists who have an intrinsic motivation to pursue academic research and allow them to do so while they also dedicate time to the firm's applied agenda. We show...

Increasing attention has been given to the fact that some multinational enterprises shift income to tax haven countries, an activity that generates inequality in corporate taxation. Here, we examine how profit shifting relates to wage inequality. Using rich matched employer-employee data from...