Parental influences, particularly parents' occupations, may influence individuals' entry into the teaching profession. Importantly, this mechanism may explain the relatively static demographic composition of the teaching force over time. We assess the role of parental influences on occupational...

This paper uses Census microdata linked with tax records to quantify the contribution of career choices - occupations and fields of study - to intergenerational income mobility. We document substantial segregation into occupations by parental income. Yet, the occupations children pursue explain...

SBTC is a powerful mechanism in explaining the increasing gap between educated and uneducated wages. However, SBTC cannot mimic the US within-group wage inequality. This paper provides an explanation for the observed intra-college group inequality by showing that the top decile earners’...

We present new evidence on the long-run trend of occupational task content by race in the United States, 1900-2021. Black workers began the transition to better paid, cognitive-intensive modern jobs at least a generation after white workers; substantial convergence only occurred from 1960...

We examine whether and how teachers' major fields of study affect students' achievement, exploiting within-student variation across subfields in natural science (i.e., physics, chemistry, biology, and Earth science). Using middle-school students' data from the Trends in International Mathematics...

While it is widely established that higher wages attract more productive individuals into teaching, it is unclear if salaries can be used to motivate existing teachers to work harder, or more productively, in any way that affects pupil outcomes. Using teachers' predicted relative wages,...

This research examines whether teacher licensure test scores and other teacher qualifications affect high school student achievement. The results are based on longitudinal student-level data from Los Angeles. The achievement analysis uses a value-added approach that adjusts for both student and...