Occupational prestige and changing higher educational policy

Abstract

This article examines the impact of higher education policy and family background on occupational prestige. It argues that changes in higher education policy have had a significant effect on the relative importance of educational attainment in determining occupational prestige, and that family background continues to have a significant effect on educational attainment and occupational prestige. The sample for this study is drawn from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The sample consists of white male household heads who were between 18 and 64 years of age in 1972. The sample was subdivided into three cohorts by age and each cohort was selected to correspond to a distinct era of higher educational policy. This study uses the following periods of higher education policy: (1) The era preceding World War II, (2) the era after World War II, essentially the period of the G.I. Bill, and (3) the era following passage of the National Defense Education Act. The results from this study indicate that educational attainment does have a smaller effect on occupational prestige for the youngest cohort. This result suggests that education per se is relatively less important when a larger share of the labor force has acquired greater years of schooling. Our results also show that family background factors tend to affect occupational prestige via educational attainment. Thus, educational attainment tends to be a significant transmission mechanism relating family background and occupational status. Therefore, the results of this study indicate that family background variables have important effects on labor-market success.