IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/h/nbr/nberch/7157.html
   My bibliography  Save this book chapter

Academic Ability, Earnings, and the Decision to Become a Teacher: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972

In: Public Sector Payrolls

Author

Listed:
  • Charles F. Manski

Abstract

Perceived shortcomings in the quality of American education at the elementary and secondary school levels have drawn much public attention recently. In particular, concern with the composition of the teacher force has been prominent. Informed assessment of the various proposals for increasing the quality of the teaching force is possible only if we can forecast the extent to which these proposals, if enacted, would influence the occupational choice decisions of high ability young adults. Until now,there has been no basis for making such forecasts.The research reported here examines the relationships between academic ability, earnings, and the decision to become a teacher through analysis of data from a national sample of college graduates. Inspection of the data reveals that the frequency of choice of teaching as an occupation is inversely- related to academic ability. Conditioning on sex and academic ability, the earnings of teachers are much lower, on average, than those of other working college graduates. Conditioning on sex, the earnings of teachers tend to rise only slightly, if at all, with academic ability. An econometric analysis suggests that in the absence of a minimum ability standard, increases in teacher earnings would yield substantial growth in the size of the teaching force but minimal improvement in the average academic ability of teachers. If teacher salaries are not increased, institution of a minimum ability standard would improve the average ability of the teaching force but reduce its size. The average ability of the teaching force can be improved and the size of the teaching force maintained if minimum ability standards are combined with sufficient salary increases. It appears that the average academic ability of teachers can be raised to the average of all college graduates if a minimum SAT score (verbal +math) of 800 is required for teacher certification and teacher salaries are raised by about ten percent over their present levels.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Charles F. Manski, 1987. "Academic Ability, Earnings, and the Decision to Become a Teacher: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972," NBER Chapters, in: Public Sector Payrolls, pages 291-316, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberch:7157
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c7157.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James J. Heckman, 1976. "The Common Structure of Statistical Models of Truncation, Sample Selection and Limited Dependent Variables and a Simple Estimator for Such Models," NBER Chapters, in: Annals of Economic and Social Measurement, Volume 5, number 4, pages 475-492, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Angrist, Joshua D. & Guryan, Jonathan, 2008. "Does teacher testing raise teacher quality? Evidence from state certification requirements," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 483-503, October.
    2. Rothstein, Jesse & Rouse, Cecilia Elena, 2011. "Constrained after college: Student loans and early-career occupational choices," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1-2), pages 149-163, February.
    3. Fullard, Joshua, 2022. "An information intervention and consent to data linkage: experimental evidence from teaching," ISER Working Paper Series 2022-01, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    4. Podgursky, Michael & Monroe, Ryan & Watson, Donald, 2004. "The academic quality of public school teachers: an analysis of entry and exit behavior," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 507-518, October.
    5. Darius Lakdawalla, 2001. "The Declining Quality of Teachers," NBER Working Papers 8263, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Geraldo Andrade Da Silva Filho & Cristine Campos De Xavier Pinto & Marcel De Toledo Vieira, 2016. "Does Money Move Teachers?," Anais do XLII Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 42nd Brazilian Economics Meeting] 240, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    7. Juan Cándido Gómez Gallego & María Concepción Pérez Cárceles & Laura Nieto Torrejón (ed.), 2017. "Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación," E-books Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación, Asociación de Economía de la Educación, edition 1, volume 12, number 12, April.
    8. Hof, Stefanie & Strupler Leiser, Mirjam & Wolter, Stefan C., 2011. "Career Changers in Teaching Jobs: A Case Study Based on the Swiss Vocational Education System," IZA Discussion Papers 5806, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Donald Boyd & Hamilton Lankford & Susanna Loeb & James Wyckoff, 2013. "Analyzing the Determinants of the Matching of Public School Teachers to Jobs: Disentangling the Preferences of Teachers and Employers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(1), pages 83-117.
    10. Fullard, Joshua, 2023. "Labour market expectations and occupational choice: evidence from teaching," ISER Working Paper Series 2023-01, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    11. Ehrenberg, R.G.Ronald G., 2004. "Econometric studies of higher education," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 121(1-2), pages 19-37.
    12. Chen, Dandan, 2009. "The economics of teacher supply in Indonesia," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4975, The World Bank.
    13. ARNAUD CHEVALIER & PETER DOLTON & STEVEN McINTOSH, 2007. "Recruiting and Retaining Teachers in the UK: An Analysis of Graduate Occupation Choice from the 1960s to the 1990s," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 74(293), pages 69-96, February.
    14. Cory Koedel & Shawn Ni & Michael Podgursky, 2014. "Who Benefits from Pension Enhancements?," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 9(2), pages 165-192, March.
    15. Wolfe, Barbara & Wilson, Kathryn & Haveman, Robert, 2001. "The role of economic incentives in teenage nonmarital childbearing choices," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(3), pages 473-511, September.
    16. Qin, Fei, 2015. "Global talent, local careers: Circular migration of top Indian engineers and professionals," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 405-420.
    17. Michela Tincani, 2014. "School Vouchers and the Joint Sorting of Students and Teachers," Working Papers 2014-012, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    18. Steingrimsdottir, Herdis, 2020. "The decreased popularity of the teaching sector in the 1970s," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    19. McFarlin Jr., Isaac, 2007. "Do school teacher parents make a difference?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(5), pages 615-628, October.
    20. Lankford, Hamilton & Wyckoff, James, 1997. "The changing structure of teacher compensation, 1970-1994," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 371-384, October.
    21. Emma García & Eunice S. Han, 2022. "Teachers’ Base Salary and Districts’ Academic Performance: Evidence From National Data," SAGE Open, , vol. 12(1), pages 21582440221, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Insoo Cho & Peter F. Orazem, 2021. "How endogenous risk preferences and sample selection affect analysis of firm survival," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 56(4), pages 1309-1332, April.
    2. Walter Beckert, 2015. "Choice in the Presence of Experts," Birkbeck Working Papers in Economics and Finance 1503, Birkbeck, Department of Economics, Mathematics & Statistics.
    3. Cameron, Trudy Ann & Shaw, W. Douglass & Ragland, Shannon E. & Callaway, J. Mac & Keefe, Sally, 1996. "Using Actual And Contingent Behavior Data With Differing Levels Of Time Aggregation To Model Recreation Demand," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 21(01), pages 1-20, July.
    4. Hans A. Holter & Dirk Krueger & Serhiy Stepanchuk, 2019. "How do tax progressivity and household heterogeneity affect Laffer curves?," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(4), pages 1317-1356, November.
    5. Michael Raper, 1999. "Self-selection bias and cost-of-living estimates," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 23(1), pages 64-77, March.
    6. Matthew Gentry & Tong Li & Jingfeng Lu, 2015. "Identification and estimation in first-price auctions with risk-averse bidders and selective entry," CeMMAP working papers CWP16/15, Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    7. Aizenman, Joshua & Ito, Hiro & Pasricha, Gurnain Kaur, 2022. "Central bank swap arrangements in the COVID-19 crisis," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    8. Trottmann, Maria & Zweifel, Peter & Beck, Konstantin, 2012. "Supply-side and demand-side cost sharing in deregulated social health insurance: Which is more effective?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 231-242.
    9. Banal-Estañol, Albert & Duso, Tomaso & Seldeslachts, Jo & Szücs, Florian, 2022. "R&D Spillovers through RJV Cooperation," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 51(4), pages 1-10.
    10. Renuka Sane & Susan Thomas, 2020. "From Participation To Repurchase: Low Income Households And Micro‐insurance," Journal of Risk & Insurance, The American Risk and Insurance Association, vol. 87(3), pages 783-814, September.
    11. Joachim Merz & Tim Rathjen, 2011. "Intensity of Time and Income Interdependent Multidimensional Poverty: Well-Being and Minimum 2DGAP – German Evidence," FFB-Discussionpaper 92, Research Institute on Professions (Forschungsinstitut Freie Berufe (FFB)), LEUPHANA University Lüneburg.
    12. Bodory, Hugo & Huber, Martin, 2018. "The causalweight package for causal inference in R," FSES Working Papers 493, Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences, University of Freiburg/Fribourg Switzerland.
    13. Michael Ziegelmeyer & Julius Nick, 2013. "Backing out of private pension provision: lessons from Germany," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 40(3), pages 505-539, August.
    14. Joseph Mason, 2001. "Do Lender of Last Resort Policies Matter? The Effects of Reconstruction Finance Corporation Assistance to Banks During the Great Depression," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 20(1), pages 77-95, September.
    15. Torres, Marcelo de O. & Felthoven, Ronald G., 2014. "Productivity growth and product choice in catch share fisheries: The case of Alaska pollock," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(PA), pages 280-289.
    16. Yuen Leng Chow & Isa E. Hafalir & Abdullah Yavas, 2015. "Auction versus Negotiated Sale: Evidence from Real Estate Sales," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 43(2), pages 432-470, June.
    17. Xavier Ramos Morilla & Josep Lluís Raymond Bara & Josep Oliver Alonso, 1999. "Not All University Degrees Yield the Same Return: Private and Social Returns to Higher Education for Males in Spain," Working Papers wpdea9904, Department of Applied Economics at Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona.
    18. Fei Yang & Chunchen Wang, 2023. "Clean energy, emission trading policy, and CO2 emissions: Evidence from China," Energy & Environment, , vol. 34(5), pages 1657-1673, August.
    19. Tarp, Finn & Simler, Kenneth R. & Matusse, Cristina & Heltberg, Rasmus & Dava, Gabriel, 2002. "The robustness of poverty profiles reconsidered," FCND discussion papers 126, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    20. Bauer, Rob & Cosemans, Mathijs & Eichholtz, Piet, 2009. "Option trading and individual investor performance," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 731-746, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberch:7157. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.