We estimate a structural dynamic programming model of schooling decisions with unobserved heterogeneity in school ability and market ability on a sample taken from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). Both the instantaneous utility of attending school and the wage regression...

We estimate a structural dynamic programming model of schooling decisions with unobserved heterogeneity in school ability and market ability on a sample taken from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). Both the instantaneous utility of attending school and the wage regression...

We estimate a structural dynamic programming model of schooling decisions and obtain individual specific estimates of the local (and average) returns to schooling as well as the returns to experience. Homogeneity of the returns to human capital is strongly rejected in favor of a discrete...

This paper contains a survey of the recent literature devoted to the returns to schooling within a dynamic structural framework. I present a historical perspective on the evolution of the literature, from early static models set in a selectivity framework (Willis and Rosen, 1979) to the recent...

The initial earnings of U.S. immigrants vary enormously by country of origin. Via three interrelated analyses, we show earnings convergence across source countries with time in the United States. Human-capital theory plausibly explains the inverse relationship between initial earnings and...

The initial earnings of U.S. immigrants vary enormously by country of origin. Via three interrelated analyses, we show earnings convergence across source countries with time in the United States Human-capital theory plausibly explains the inverse relationship between initial earnings and...

Two radically different descriptions of immigrant earnings trajectories in the U.S. have emerged. One asserts that immigrant men following the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act have low initial earnings and high earnings growth. Another asserts that post-1965 immigrants have low initial...

Using microdata from the 1960-2000 decennial censuses, this paper explores how large initial differences in immigrant earnings by country of origin change with duration in the United States. One analysis reveals that country of origin adds less to the explanation of earnings, among working-age...