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Using a large and novel administrative dataset, this paper investigates variation in returns to different higher education ‘degrees’ (subject-institution combinations) in the United Kingdom. Conditioning on a rich set background characteristics, it finds substantial variation in returns, even within subject, across universities with very similar selectivity levels, suggesting degree choices matter a lot for later-life earnings. Selectivity is weakly related to returns through most of the distribution but strongly positively correlated at the top end. Other than selectivity, returns are poorly correlated with observable degree characteristics, which has implications for student choices and the incentives of universities.
Authors
Lorraine Dearden
Ian Walker
Research Fellow
Luke is a Research Fellow at the IFS and his general research interests include education policy, political economy and poverty and inequality.
Anna Vignoles
Associate Director
Jack's main interests lie in human capital accumulation and discrete choice dynamic modelling.
Chris Belfield
Yu Zhu
Matt Dickson
Laura van der Erve
Franz Buscha
Working Paper details
- DOI
- 10.1920/wp.ifs.2021.2421
- Publisher
- Institute for Fiscal Studies
Suggested citation
Belfield, C et al. (2021). How much does degree choice matter?. London: Institute for Fiscal Studies. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/how-much-does-degree-choice-matter (accessed: 25 April 2024).
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