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Title: The Causes and Consequences of Cross-Country Di erences in Schooling Attainment

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2008

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Abstract: This paper uses labor market evidence to quantify the importance of quality-adjusted schooling diff erences in accounting for cross-country income diff erences. I model labor markets that are consistent with cross-country data on schooling attainment, education quality, and the average returns to schooling of a country's emigrants and its non-migrants. The model suggests that the Mincerian returns to schooling of immigrants to the United States measure the education qualities of their source countries. Measured this way, quality di fferences across countries are large, and the calibrated model shows that schooling accounts for a factor of 5 of the income diff erence between the U.S. and the poorest countries. The evidence suggests that immigrants to the U.S. are positively selected members of their source country, and that immigrants from developing countries are more selected than those from developedcountries. Then the low education quality measured in the sample actually overestimates the education quality of the average non-migrant, particularly for developing countries. Two methods of controlling for selection among immigrants thus predict a moderately larger role for schooling, between a factor of 6.5 and 7.9.

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Authors: Schoellman, Todd

Publisher: Clemson University

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Education, Labor Force and Occupational Structure

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