Specializing in growing sectors: Wage returns and gender differences

We test whether specializing in a field of study when related sectors are growing matters for future labor market outcomes. For eight high-income OECD countries we match data on individuals' specialization decisions in higher education from PIAAC (Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies) with national statistics on value added of related economic sectors. We find that individuals who chose fields of studies when related sectors were growing earn higher wages later in life. We also find that men are less likely to specialize in growing sectors. However, this is entirely driven by the fact that men avoid specializing in traditionally female fields, whose related sectors have grown more over recent decades (e.g. health, education). Only for men who obtained at least a Bachelor's degree can this avoidance be explained by lower wages. Men who obtained a vocational degree in growing female fields earn similar wages later in life as those specializing in shrinking male fields. We present suggestive evidence that gendered specialization decisions, paired with growth in traditionally female sectors could have contributed to narrowing gender wage gaps in recent decades