Yale University
Yale Department of Economics
Search
Back to Economics
Research Assistants

Labor Market Returns to Graduate Degrees

The project involves the use of National Science Foundation data and the Texas School Project data to study the economic value of graduate education. The specific questions include:

  1. What are the labor-market returns to specific graduate degrees, such as an MBA or a JD?
  2. How does the labor market return to graduate degrees depend on a student’s college major?
  3. Does the labor market return to a particular graduate degree depend on the student’s characteristics and socioeconomic background?
  4. How does the labor market return to undergraduate and graduate degrees depend on the quality of the undergraduate and graduate institution and program?
  5. How do graduate degrees affect individuals at different stages of their career?
  6. How does the labor market return to graduate degrees depend on the student’s industry of employment prior to graduate school?

The student will work with Altonji and his co-author Zhengren Zhu to write STATA programs to process the data, perform statistical analyses, create graphs and figures. He or she will also gather data from US News and World Report and other sources on the quality of various graduate programs.

Requisite Skills and Qualifications:

Prior computing experience and a course or courses in statistical computing will be extremely valuable. My hope is that the student will continue to work with me on the project during the fall 2020 semester