IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/canjec/v59y2026i1p312-332.html

Institution, major and firm‐specific premia: Evidence from administrative data

Author

Listed:
  • Ben Ost
  • Weixiang Pan
  • Douglas Webber

Abstract

We examine how a student's field of degree and institution attended contribute to the labour market outcomes of young graduates. Administrative panel data that combines student transcripts with matched employer‐employee records allow us to provide the first decomposition of premia into individual‐ and firm‐specific components. We find that both major and institutional premia are more strongly related to the firm‐specific component of wages than the individual‐specific component of wages. On average, a student's major is a more important predictor of future wages than the selectivity of the institution attended, but major premia (and their relative ranking) can differ substantially across institutions, suggesting the importance of program‐level data for prospective students and their parents. Primes liées à l'établissement, au domaine d'études et à l'entreprise : données probantes tirées de sources administratives. Nous examinons l'influence du domaine d'études et de l'établissement d'enseignement fréquenté sur les résultats sur le marché du travail des jeunes diplômés. Des données administratives longitudinales, combinant les relevés de notes des étudiants et les dossiers employeurs‐employés appariés, nous permettent d'effectuer la première décomposition des primes en composantes propres aux personnes et aux entreprises. Nos résultats montrent que les primes associées au programme d'études et à l'établissement sont davantage liées à la composante propre à l'entreprise qu'à celle propre à la personne. En moyenne, le domaine d'études est un meilleur prédicteur des salaires futurs que la sélection de l'établissement fréquenté. Toutefois, les primes liées aux programmes (et leur hiérarchie relative) varient considérablement selon les établissements, ce qui souligne l'importance des données à l'échelle des programmes pour les futurs étudiants et leurs parents.

Suggested Citation

  • Ben Ost & Weixiang Pan & Douglas Webber, 2026. "Institution, major and firm‐specific premia: Evidence from administrative data," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 59(1), pages 312-332, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:wly:canjec:v:59:y:2026:i:1:p:312-332
    DOI: 10.1111/caje.70050
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/caje.70050
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/caje.70050?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    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:wly:canjec:v:59:y:2026:i:1:p:312-332. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1540-5982 .

    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.