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Ability, families, education and earnings in Britain

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Author Info
Lorraine Dearden () (Institute for Fiscal Studies and Bedford Group, Institute of Education, University of London)

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Abstract

The paper estimates the returns to education for a cohort of individuals born in Britain in March 1958 who have been followed since birth until the age of 33. The data used has a wealth of information on family background including parental education, social class and interest shown in the child's education as well as measures of ability. These variables are typically missing in studies looking at the returns to schooling. In the paper we Ůd that the return to an additional year of full-time education for the UK population as a whole is somewhere between 5 to 7 per cent for men and 8 to 10 per cent for women even after correcting for the eĥcts of measurement error. The paper also presents evidence that the returns to an additional year of schooling in the UK are heterogeneous. The results from the paper suggest that individuals undertaking education involving some sort of formal qualification have significantly larger rates of return to an additional year of education than individuals who have obtained no formal education. Individuals whose highest educational qualification is an A level (the highest schooling qualification in the UK) appear to have the highest average return to an additional year of education at around 15 per cent for both men and women. There is also some evidence that individuals with lower tastes for education, have significantly higher marginal returns to education. The results of the paper suggest that recent IV estimates of the returns to schooling in the UK, which exceed typical OLS estimates, may overestimate the average marginal return for the population as a whole.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Institute for Fiscal Studies in its series IFS Working Papers with number W98/14.

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Length: 43 pp.
Date of creation: Jul 1998
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:ifs:ifsewp:98/14

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Postal: The Institute for Fiscal Studies 7 Ridgmount Street LONDON WC1E 7AE
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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Colm Harmon; & Ian Walker, 1995. "Estimates of Economic Return to Schooling in the UK," Economics, Finance and Accounting Department Working Paper Series n540195, Department of Economics, Finance and Accounting, National University of Ireland - Maynooth.
  2. Orley Ashenfelter & David Zimmerman, 1993. "Estimates of the Return to Schooling From Sibling Data: Fathers, Sons and Brothers," Working Papers 697, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section.. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  3. Griliches, Zvi & Mason, William M, 1972. "Education, Income, and Ability," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(3), pages S74-S103, Part II, . [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Lorraine Dearden & Javier Ferri & Costas Meghir, 2000. "The effect of school quality on educational attainment and wages," IFS Working Papers W00/22, Institute for Fiscal Studies. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. James J. Heckman, 1995. "Instrumental Variables: A Cautionary Tale," NBER Technical Working Papers 0185, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. David Card, 1993. "Using Geographic Variation in College Proximity to Estimate the Return to Schooling," Working Papers 696, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section.. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  7. Heckman, James J & Ichimura, Hidehiko & Todd, Petra, 1998. "Matching as an Econometric Evaluation Estimator," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 65(2), pages 261-94, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Blackburn, McKinley L & Neumark, David, 1993. "Omitted-Ability Bias and the Increase in the Return to Schooling," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 11(3), pages 521-44, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Harmon, C & Ian Walker, 1995. "Estimates of the economic return to schooling for the UK," IFS Working Papers W95/12, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
  10. Pagan, Adrian, 1984. "Econometric Issues in the Analysis of Regressions with Generated Regressors," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 25(1), pages 221-47, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. Ashenfelter, Orley & Krueger, Alan B, 1994. "Estimates of the Economic Returns to Schooling from a New Sample of Twins," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1157-73, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  12. repec:fth:prinin:317 is not listed on IDEAS
  13. repec:fth:prinin:318 is not listed on IDEAS
  14. Butcher, Kristin F & Case, Anne, 1994. "The Effect of Sibling Sex Composition on Women's Education and Earnings," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 109(3), pages 531-63, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Smith, Richard J & Blundell, Richard W, 1986. "An Exogeneity Test for a Simultaneous Equation Tobit Model with an Application to Labor Supply," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(3), pages 679-85, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Arellano, Manuel & Meghir, Costas, 1992. "Female Labour Supply and On-the-Job Search: An Empirical Model Estimated Using Complementary Data Sets," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 59(3), pages 537-59, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  17. John Bound & David A. Jaeger & Regina Baker, 1993. "The Cure Can Be Worse than the Disease: A Cautionary Tale Regarding Instrumental Variables," NBER Technical Working Papers 0137, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  18. Griliches, Zvi, 1977. "Estimating the Returns to Schooling: Some Econometric Problems," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 45(1), pages 1-22, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  19. David Card, 1994. "Earnings, Schooling, and Ability Revisited," NBER Working Papers 4832, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
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(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. repec:cep:sticas:029 is not listed on IDEAS
  2. Lorraine Dearden, 1999. "Qualifications and earnings in Britain: how reliable are conventional OLS estimates of the returns to education?," IFS Working Papers W99/07, Institute for Fiscal Studies. [Downloadable!]
  3. repec:ese:iserwp: is not listed on IDEAS
  4. Muhammad Purnagunawan, 2008. "Earning Motivation and The Conventional Earning Function," Working Papers in Economics and Development Studies (WoPEDS) 200805, Department of Economics, Padjadjaran University, revised Sep 2008. [Downloadable!]
  5. Del Bono, Emilia, 2004. "Pre-Marital Fertility and Labour Market Opportunities: Evidence from the 1970 British Cohort Study," IZA Discussion Papers 1320, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
  6. Arnaud Chevalier & Gauthier Lanot, 2002. "The Relative Effect of Family Characteristics and Financial Situation on Educational Achievement," Education Economics, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 10(2), pages 165-181, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Sackey, 2008. "Private Returns to Education in Ghana: Implications for Investments in Schooling and Migration," Research Papers RP_174, African Economic Research Consortium. [Downloadable!]
  8. Emilia Del Bono, 2004. "Pre-Marital Fertility and Labour Market Opportunities: Evidence from the 1970 British Cohort Study," Economics Series Working Papers 202, University of Oxford, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  9. Arnaud Chevalier & Gauthier Lanot, 2001. "The relative effect of family and financial characteristics on educational echievement," CEE Discussion Papers 0008, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE. [Downloadable!]
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