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Welcome to the Club: The Returns to an Elite Degree for American Lawyers

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  • Oyer, Paul

    (Stanford University)

  • Schaefer, Scott

    (University of UT and Northwestern U)

Abstract

Competition for seats in elite U.S. graduate school programs has intensified dramatically over the past 40 years. In this paper, we study the market for young attorneys to illuminate the role that elite graduate programs play in human capital development. We find that attorneys who graduate from law schools ranked in the top ten nationally earn considerably more than those without such a qualification, even compared to attorneys who graduate from schools ranked 11-20. The premium to an elite education carries over to an attorney's undergraduate institution as well, and we find that elite bachelors and elite law degrees appear to be close substitutes in terms of their effects on salaries. We compare our findings to the broader literature on the returns to attending a selective college, and find that the elite-law-school premium is more robust to various methods for correcting for selection on ability than the broader premium to attending a selective college. We discuss several potential reasons for why an elite school premium may exist in this labor market.

Suggested Citation

  • Oyer, Paul & Schaefer, Scott, 2012. "Welcome to the Club: The Returns to an Elite Degree for American Lawyers," Research Papers 3044, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecl:stabus:3044
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    File URL: http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/working-papers/welcome-club-returns-elite-degree-american-lawyers
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    Cited by:

    1. Freier, Ronny & Schumann, Mathias & Siedler, Thomas, 2015. "The earnings returns to graduating with honors — Evidence from law graduates," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 39-50.
    2. Michael Simkovic & Frank McIntyre, 2014. "The Economic Value of a Law Degree," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 43(2), pages 249-289.
    3. Adams, Renée & Keloharju, Matti & Knüpfer, Samuli, 2018. "Are CEOs born leaders? Lessons from traits of a million individuals," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(2), pages 392-408.

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