The U.S. wage structure evolved across the last century: narrowing from 1910 to 1950, fairly stable in the 1950s and 1960s, widening rapidly during the 1980s, and polarizing since the late 1980s. We document the spectacular rise of U.S. wage inequality after 1980 and place recent changes into a century-long historical perspective to understand the sources of change. The majority of the increase in wage inequality since 1980 can be accounted for by rising educational wage differentials, just as a substantial part of the decrease in wage inequality in the earlier era can be accounted for by decreasing educational wage differentials. Although skill-biased technological change has generated rapid growth in the relative demand for more-educated workers for at least the past century, increases in the supply of skills, from rising educational attainment of the U.S. work force, more than kept pace for most of the twentieth century. Since 1980, however, a sharp decline in skill supply growth driven by a slowdown in the rise of educational attainment of successive U.S. born cohorts has been a major factor in the surge in educational wage differentials. Polarization set in during the late 1980s with employment shifts into high- and low-wage jobs at the expense of the middle leading to rapidly rising upper tail wage inequality but modestly falling lower tail wage inequality.

U.S. educational and occupational wage differentials were exceptionally high at the dawn of the twentiethcentury and then decreased in several stages over the next eight decades. But starting in the early 1980sthe labor market premium to skill rose sharply and by 2005 the college wage premium was back atits 1915 level. The twentieth century contains two inequality tales: one declining and one rising. Weuse a supply-demand-institutions framework to understand the factors that produced these changesfrom 1890 to 2005. We find that strong secular growth in the relative demand for more educated workerscombined with fluctuations in the growth of relative skill supplies go far to explain the long-run evolutionof U.S. educational wage differentials. An increase in the rate of growth of the relative supply of skillsassociated with the high school movement starting around 1910 played a key role in narrowing educationalwage differentials from 1915 to 1980. The slowdown in the growth of the relative supply of collegeworkers starting around 1980 was a major reason for the surge in the college wage premium from1980 to 2005. Institutional factors were important at various junctures, especially during the 1940sand the late 1970s.

Womens increased involvement in the economy was the most significant change in labor markets during the past century. Their modern economic role emerged in the United States in four distinct phases. The first three were evolutionary; the last was revolutionary. The revolution was a quiet one, not the big-bang type. The evolutionary phases led, slowly, tothe revolutionary phase. First, I will discuss the three evolutionary phases and how they led to the revolutionary phase. I will then describe the changes that occurred during the revolutionary phase and end with whether the revolution, as some have claimed, is stalled or being reversed...

Women are currently the majority of U.S. college students and of those receiving a bachelors degree, but were 39 percent of undergraduates in 1960. We use three longitudinal data sets of high school graduates in 1957, 1972, and 1992 to understand the narrowing of the gender gap in college and its reversal. From 1972 to 1992 high school girls narrowed the gap with boys in math and science course taking and in achievement test scores. These variables, which we term the proximate determinants, can account for 30 to 60 percent of the relative increase in womens college completion rate. Behind these changes were several others: the future work expectations of young women increased greatly between 1968 and 1979 and the age at first marriage for college graduate women rose by 2.5 years in the 1970s, allowing them to be more serious students. The reversal of the college gender gap, rather than just its elimination, was due in part to the persistence of behavioral and developmental differences between males and females.

Throughout recorded history, individual women have reached summits, and their accomplishments have been touted as evidence that women could achieve greatness. But it has taken considerably longer for substantial numbers of women—more than a token few— to reach the peaks. Until recently, the vast majority of women—even college graduates—occupied the valleys, not the summits. They had jobs, not careers. The only reason we can have a meaningful discussion today about “women at the top” is because a quiet revolution took place about 30 years ago. It followed on the heels

Meaningful discussions about women at the top' can take place today only because a quiet revolution occurred about thirty years ago. The transformation was startlingly rapid and was accomplished by the unwitting foot soldiers of an upheaval that transformed the workforce. It can be seen in a number of social and economic indicators. Sharp breaks are apparent in data on labor market expectations, college graduation rates, professional degrees, labor force participation rates, and the age at first marriage. Turning points are also evident in most of the series for college majors and occupations. Inflection or break points in almost all of these series occur from the late 1960s to the early 1970s and for cohorts born during the 1940s. Whatever the precise reasons for change, a great divide in college-graduate women's lives and employment occurred about 35 years ago. Previously, women who reached the peaks often made solo climbs and symbolized that women, contrary to conventional wisdom, could achieve greatness. But real change demanded a march by the masses from the valley to the summit.' That march began with cohorts born in the late 1940s.

After two decades in the economic doldrums, the U.S. economy revived strongly in the late 1990s, as the rate of productivity growth doubled. Although continued rapid growth during the next several decades is certainly possible, it is not assured-and the staked are enormous. This chapter outlines that is known about the sources of U.S. economic growth and describes steps that policymakers-public and private-can take to realize the potential for growth.

By the mid-nineteenth century school enrollment rates in the United States exceeded those of any other nation in the world and by the early twentieth century the United States had accomplished mass education at all levels. No country was able to close the gap until the last quarter of the twentieth century. For much of its history U.S. education was spurred by a set of virtues, the most important of which were public provision by small fiscally independent districts, public funding, secular control, gender neutrality, open access, a forgiving system, and an academic curriculum. The outcomes of the virtues were an enormous diffusion of educational institutions and the early spread of mass education. America borrowed its educational institutions from Europe but added to them in ways that served to enhance competition and openness. The virtues of long ago need not be the virtues of today, and they also need not have been virtuous in all places and at all times in the past. In this essay we explore the historical origins of these virtues and find that almost all were in place in the period before the American Civil War.

In the three decades from 1910 to 1940, the fraction of U.S. youths enrolled in public and private secondary schools increased from 18 to 71 percent and the fraction graduating soared from 9 to 51 percent. At the same time, state compulsory education and child labor legislation became morestringent and potentially constrained secondary-school aged youths. It might appear from the timing and the specifics of this history that the laws caused the increase in education rates. We evaluate the possibility that state compulsory schooling and child labor laws caused the increase in education rates by using contemporaneous evidence on enrollments. We also use micro-data from the 1960 census to examine the effect of the laws on overall educational attainment. Our estimation approach exploits cross-state differences in the timing of changes in state laws. We find that the expansion of state compulsory schooling and child labor laws from 1910 to 1939 can, at best, account for 5 percent of the increase in high school enrollments and can account for about the same portion of the increase in the eventual educational attainment for the affected cohorts over the period.

In the past two decades gender pay differences have narrowed considerably and a declining significance of gender has pervaded the labor market in numerous ways. This paper contends that in thefirst several decades of the twentieth century there was a rising significance of gender. The emergence of gender distinctions accompanied several important changes in the economy including the rise ofwhite-collar work for women and increases in women's educational attainment. Firms adopted policies not to hire women in particular occupations and to exclude men from other occupations. A model ofdiscrimination is developed in which men oppose the hiring of women into certain positions. The assumptions of the model break down when women acquire known and verifiable credentials. The shift from the rising to the declining significance of gender may have involved such a change.

In the past two decades gender pay differences have narrowed considerably and a declining significance of gender has pervaded the labor market in numerous ways. This paper contends that in the first several decades of the twentieth century there was a rising significance of gender. The emergence of gender distinctions accompanied several important changes in the economy including the rise of white-collar work for women and increases in women's educational attainment. Firms adopted policies not to hire women in particular occupations and to exclude men from other occupations. A model of discrimination is developed in which men oppose the hiring of women into certain positions. The assumptions of the model break down when women acquire known and verifiable credentials. The shift from the rising to the declining significance of gender may have involved such a change.

The fraction of U. S. college graduate women entering professional programs increased substantially just after 1970, and the age at first marriage among all U. S. college graduate women began to soar around the same year. We explore the relationship between these two changes and the diffusion of the birth control pill ('the pill') among young, unmarried college graduate women. Although the pill was approved in 1960 by the Food and Drug Administration and spread rapidly among married women, it did not diffuse among young, single women until the late 1960s after state law changes reduced the age of majority and extended 'mature minor' decisions. We present both descriptive time series and formal econometric evidence that exploit cross-state and cross-cohort variation in pill availability to young, unmarried women, establishing the 'power of the pill' in lowering the costs of long-duration professional education for women and raising the age at first marriage.

The modern concept of wealth of nations emerged by the early twentieth century. Capital embodied in people human capital mattered. The United States led all nations in mass post elementary education during the human-capital century. The American system of education was shaped by New World endowments and Republican ideology and was characterized by virtues including publicly funded mass education that was open and forgiving, academic yet practical, secular, gender neutral, and funded and controlled by small districts. The American educational template was a remarkable success, but recent educational concerns and policy have redefined some of its 'virtues' as 'vices.'

Inequality across the twentieth century United States is a tale in two parts. The last half-century is the better known of the two and has been a period of widening inequality. But the first half-century, as we will demonstrate, was a period of narrowing inequality. It is the less well understood of the two tales largely because of data deficiencies. The federal population census, which provides much of the evidence on the distribution of material well being, first asked questions on income (and education) in 1940. We assemble data from a wide variety of sources showing conclusively that there was, during the first half of the century, a substantial decrease in various measures of inequality. The wage structure in manufacturing narrowed, the premium to various white-collar occupations decreased as did that for many craft trades, and the return to years of post-elementary education fell. These declines, moreover, came in two large spurts, both during wartime periods that were subsequently sustained. Not only was there a wage and income compression in the 1940s, about which much has been written, but there was also a narrowing in the late 1910s. Both periods of reductions in the premium to skill and decreases in the pecuniary return to education coincided, as well, with expansions in education, first for secondary schooling and later at the college level.

We briefly summarize the facts about the U.S. educational lead during most of the twentieth century and suggest why the U.S. led in formal schooling. We then comment on the probable consequences for distribution and economic growth.

The modern concept of the wealth of nations emerged by the early twentieth century. Capital embodied in people human capital mattered. The United States led all nations in mass postelementary education during the human-capital century.' The American system of education was shaped by New World endowments and Republican ideology and was characterized by virtues including publicly funded mass education that was open and forgiving, academic yet practical, secular, gender neutral, and funded and controlled by small districts. The American educational template was a remarkable success, but recent educational concerns and policy have redefined some of its 'virtues' as 'vices.'

At the dawn of the twentieth century the industrial giants watched each other cautiously. The British sent high-ranking commissions to the United States and the United States sent similar groups to Britain and Germany. All were looking over their shoulders to see what made for economic greatness and what would ensure supremacy in the future. The two leading economic nations had grown closer in per capita income since 1850 and were fierce competitors in product markets. It was a moment of angst for Britain and one of enormous possibility for the followers.

We present the first estimates of the returns to years of schooling before 1940 using a large sample individuals (from the 1915 Iowa State Census). The returns to a year of high school or college were substantial in 1915about 11 percent for all males and in excess of 12 percent for young males. Education enabled individuals to enter lucrative white-collar jobs, but sizable educational wage differentials also existed within occupational groups. Returns were substantial even for those in farming. We find, using U.S. census data, that returns to education decreased between 1915 and 1940 and again during the 1940s.