Broken Promise of College: New Educational Mechanisms for the Intergenerational Earnings Association in the 21st Century

Byeongdon Oh
ChangHwan Kim, University of Kansas

Previous studies have shown that intergenerational socioeconomic association becomes weaker as children’s education level increases and is negligible among college graduates. A college degree is known as the great equalizer for intergenerational social mobility. Recent studies, however, reported that the strong intergenerational association reemerges among advanced degree holders. We examine the mechanisms behind the reemergence of the intergenerational association at the post-baccalaureate level using the 2010, 2013, 2015, and 2017 National Survey of College Graduates data. Our results show that the strong intergenerational socioeconomic immobility among advanced degree holders is fully attributable to three educational sorting mechanisms: children from high-SES families (1) obtain expensive and financially rewarding advanced degrees, (2) attend selective institutions and major in hyper-lucrative fields of study such as law and medicine in graduate school, and (3) complete their education at a younger age and enjoy income growth over more years in the labor market.

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 Presented in Session 7. Intergenerational Transmission of Privilege and Disadvantage