Causes and Consequences of the Slowdown in Educational Attainment in the U.S.

[摘要]本项目将研究1950年以后出生的美国人受教育程度下降的原因和后果。在1950年之前出生的人中，每连续5年出生的年轻男性的大学完成率都比前一个高出2.5%左右。这一趋势在1950年以后出生的人群中停止并突然逆转。即使在今天，18-21岁男性的入学率也没有恢复到20世纪60年代中期的水平，当时40年代末出生的人都在上学。类似的，但没有那么明显的减缓影响了妇女的受教育程度。该项目的第一部分将分析教育趋势放缓和逆转的后果。1975年至1995年期间的数据的初步证据表明，大学毕业生在年轻男性群体中的供应变化，既可以解释过去十年中年轻工人上大学的相对回报率的迅速上升，也可以解释从20世纪70年代中期到90年代中期所有年龄段的大学回报率的总体上升。该项目将开发和测试针对特定年龄组的大学回报与特定年龄组、其他年龄组和整个经济中大学工作者的相对供给之间关系的替代模型。它还将调查大学毕业生年龄结构变化的其他可能解释，包括与技能偏向的技术变革相关的需求侧解释。该项目的第二部分将研究1950年前和1950年后人群受教育程度上升趋势中断的其他解释。将探讨的潜在解释包括父母教育和其他家庭背景特征变化的作用；《退伍军人法案》和退伍军人教育福利的影响；越南时期政策草案的影响；供给限制的影响，是由1950后群体的规模相对较大，以及20世纪70年代高校基础设施投资的相对放缓造成的。

AbstractSBR-9905257This project will study the causes and consequences of the slow-down in educational attainment that occurred for cohorts born after 1950 in the United States. Among those born prior to 1950, each successive 5-year cohort of young men had about a 2.5 percent higher college completion rate than the preceding one. This trend stopped and abruptly reversed with cohorts born after 1950. Even today, the school enrollment rates of 18-21 year old men have not yet resumed to the levels ofthe mid-1960s, when people born in the late 1940s were in school. A similar although less dramatic slowdown has affected the educational attainment of women.Part I of the project will analyze the consequences of the slow-down and reversal in education trends across cohorts. Initial evidence from data over the 1975-95 period suggests that the shift in the supply of college graduates among younger cohorts of men can account for both the rapid rise in the relative returns to college for younger workers over the past decade, and for the overall rise in retums to college for all age groups from the mid-1970s to the mid-199Os. This project will develop and test alternative models of the link between age-group-specific returns to college and the relative supplies of college workers in a given age group, in other age groups, and in the economy as a whole. It will also investigate other potential explanations for the changing age structure of the returns to college, including demand-side explanations related to skill-biased technical change.The second part of the project will study altemative explanations for the break in the trend of rising educational attainment between pre-1950 and post-1950 cohorts. Among the potential explanations that will be explored are the role of changing parental education and other family background characteristics; the effect of the G.I. Bill and veteran education benefits; the effect of Viet Nam-era draft policies; and the effect of supply constraints, caused by the relatively large size of the post-1950 cohorts and a relative slow down in investment in college and university infrastructure in the 1970s.