IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mtl/montec/11-2014.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Explaining the Evolution of Educational Attainment in the U.S

Author

Listed:
  • Rui CASTRO
  • Daniele COEN-PIRANI

Abstract

We study the evolution of educational attainment of the 1932–1972 cohorts using a calibrated model of investment in human capital with heterogeneous learning ability. The inter-cohort variation in schooling is driven by changes in skill prices, tuition, and education quality over time, and average learning ability across cohorts. A version of the model with static expectations is successful in accounting for the main patterns in the data. Rising skill prices for college explain the rapid increase in college graduation till the 1948 cohort. The measured decline in average learning ability contributes to explain the stagnation in college graduation between the 1948 and 1972 cohorts.

Suggested Citation

  • Rui CASTRO & Daniele COEN-PIRANI, 2014. "Explaining the Evolution of Educational Attainment in the U.S," Cahiers de recherche 11-2014, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en économie quantitative, CIREQ.
    • Handle: RePEc:mtl:montec:11-2014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.cireqmontreal.com/wp-content/uploads/cahiers/11-2014-cah.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thomas Lemieux & David Card, 2001. "Going to College to Avoid the Draft: The Unintended Legacy of the Vietnam War," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 97-102, May.
    2. Joshua D. Angrist & Stacey H. Chen, 2011. "Schooling and the Vietnam-Era GI Bill: Evidence from the Draft Lottery," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(2), pages 96-118, April.
    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. Delalibera, Bruno Ricardo & Ferreira, Pedro Cavalcanti, 2019. "Early childhood education and economic growth," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 82-104.
    2. Keller, Elisa, 2014. "The slowdown in American educational attainment," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 252-270.
    3. Ferreira, Pedro Cavalcanti & Delalibera, Bruno Ricardo, 2016. "Economic growth and complementarity between stages of human capital," FGV EPGE Economics Working Papers (Ensaios Economicos da EPGE) 779, EPGE Brazilian School of Economics and Finance - FGV EPGE (Brazil).

    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. Brian Duncan & Hani Mansour & Bryson Rintala, 2019. "Weighing The Military Option: The Effects Of Wartime Conditions On Investments In Human Capital," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 57(1), pages 264-282, January.
    2. Eva Deuchert & Martin Huber, 2017. "A Cautionary Tale About Control Variables in IV Estimation," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 79(3), pages 411-425, June.
    3. Bauer, Thomas K. & Bender, Stefan & Paloyo, Alfredo R. & Schmidt, Christoph M., 2012. "Evaluating the labor-market effects of compulsory military service," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(4), pages 814-829.
    4. Jason M. Lindo & Charles Stoecker, 2014. "Drawn Into Violence: Evidence On “What Makes A Criminal” From The Vietnam Draft Lotteries," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 52(1), pages 239-258, January.
    5. Resul Cesur & Joseph J. Sabia & W. David Bradford, 2019. "Did the War on Terror Ignite an Opioid Epidemic?," NBER Working Papers 26264, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Fiorini, Mario & Katrien Stevens, 2014. "Assessing the Monotonicity Assumption in IV and fuzzy RD designs," Working Papers 2014-13, University of Sydney, School of Economics.
    7. Rui Castro & Daniele Coen-Pirani, 2016. "Explaining the Evolution of Educational Attainment in the United States," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 8(3), pages 77-112, July.
    8. Xintong Wang & Carlos A. Flores & Alfonso Flores-Lagunes, 2020. "The Effects of Vietnam-Era Military Service on the Long-Term Health of Veterans: A Bounds Analysis," Center for Policy Research Working Papers 234, Center for Policy Research, Maxwell School, Syracuse University.
    9. Majbouri, Mahdi, 2017. "Sir! I'd Rather Go to School, Sir!," IZA Discussion Papers 10787, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Daniel Grossman & John Cawley & Damien de Walque, 2018. "Effect of Stress on Later‐Life Health: Evidence from the Vietnam War Draft," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(1), pages 142-165, July.
    11. Christofides, Louis N. & Hoy, Michael & Milla, Joniada & Stengos, Thanasis, 2015. "Nature or Nurture in Higher Education? Inter-generational Implications of the Vietnam-Era Lottery," IZA Discussion Papers 9046, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Erik Grönqvist & Erik Lindqvist, 2016. "The Making of a Manager: Evidence from Military Officer Training," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(4), pages 869-898.
    13. Buckles, Kasey & Malamud, Ofer & Morrill, Melinda Sandler & Wozniak, Abigail, 2012. "The Effect of College Education on Health," IZA Discussion Papers 6659, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. Pierre Mouganie, 2020. "Conscription and the Returns to Education: Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 122(3), pages 1112-1139, July.
    15. Oliver Vanden Eynde, 2016. "Military Service and Human Capital Accumulation: Evidence from Colonial Punjab," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 51(4), pages 10031035-10.
    16. Torun, Huzeyfe & Tumen, Semih, 2016. "The effects of compulsory military service exemption on education and labor market outcomes: Evidence from a natural experiment," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 16-35.
    17. Handy, Christopher & Shester, Katharine, 2020. "The Effect of Birth Order on Educational Attainment among the Baby Boom Generation," MPRA Paper 102426, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Christopher Handy & Katharine L. Shester, 2022. "Birth order and the decline in college completion among the baby boom generation," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(4), pages 1626-1643, October.
    19. John Bailey Jones & Fang Yang, 2016. "Skill-Biased Technical Change and the Cost of Higher Education," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(3), pages 621-662.
    20. Elena Kotyrlo & Elena Varshavskaya, 2022. "Impact of the compulsory military service reform of 2007–2008 on the demand for higher education," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(4), pages 715-735, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    educational attainment; human capital; skill prices; inequality; cohorts;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:mtl:montec:11-2014. 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: Sharon BREWER (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cdmtlca.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.