Fracking innovations revolutionized the United States oil and gas industry and facilitated a boom in energy production in states with oil and gas resources. This paper examines effects of oil and gas booms within a state on individual employment and earnings. To account for endogenous migration...

I use the American Community Survey to examine how college earnings premiums differ across small metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) in the U.S. I document that the West North Central Division (Plains Region) has especially low average college earnings premiums. Controlling for observable MSA...

Progress in narrowing black-white earnings differences has been far from continuous, with some of the apparent progress resulting from labor force withdrawal among lower-skilled African Americans. This paper builds on prior research and documents racial and ethnic differences in male earnings...

Using the 3-year sample of the American Community Survey (ACS) for 2009 to 2011, we compute public school teacher salaries for comparison across U.S. states. Teacher salaries are adjusted for state differences in teacher characteristics, cost of living, household amenity attractiveness and...

There is growing concern that the U.S. is producing too few college graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, and there is a desire to understand how various policies affect college major decisions. This paper uses student administrative records from the...

Formal schooling increases earnings and provides other individual benefits. However, societal benefits of education may exceed individual benefits. Research finds that increased average education levels in an area are correlated with higher earnings, even for locals with relatively little...