Gender and Human Capital Returns

Here is an interesting fact: Women earn a higher rate of return from a college degree than men.  In particular:

After controlling for various demographic factors, the researchers found that female graduates earned more than $6,500 more per year than women with just a high school diploma, and more than $4,500 more than women who dropped out of college. Male graduates, by contrast, earned only about $2,700 more than high school graduates, and about the same amount as male college drop-outs. 

The findings are consistent with past research, which has showed that jobs are much more gender-segregated in low-education occupations. Female drop-outs tend to concentrate in low-paying service-sector jobs, whereas less-educated men are more likely to find work in better-paying industries such as manufacturing and construction.

HPEC

If you are a high school student, or teach economics to high school students, you most definitely will want to click here.

A Profile of Stanley Fischer

In the Washington Post.  Stan was my PhD dissertation adviser.

Why $9?

Since the State of the Union address, the minimum wage has heated up again as a political issue.  You can read my previous posts on the topic by clicking here.  (Unfortunately, some of the links in these old posts are now dead.)

There is one question I would like to see some reporter ask Alan Krueger, the president's chief economist: How did they decide that $9 per hour is the right level?  Why not $10 or $12 or $15 or $20?  Presumably, the president's economic team must believe that the adverse employment effects become sufficiently large at some point that further increases are undesirable.  But what calculations led them to decide that $9 strikes the right balance?

Econ Summer Camp

Those with an interest in the history of economic thought might want to consider this summer program.  I have been told that the program is designed primarily for faculty members in economics, other social sciences, and the humanities, though three of the twenty-five slots are reserved for graduate students.

The Growth of the Welfare State

Source. Click on the graphic to enlarge.

Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, and Your Economists, Too

Click here to read my column in Sunday's NY Times.