RACE, GENDER, AND THE ROLE OF EDUCATION IN EARNINGS INEQUALITY - AN INTRODUCTION

This article serves as an introduction to an issue of the Economics of Education Review devoted to research on the role of education in expl aining economic inequality among different ethnic/race and gender grou ps in national labor markets. The article admits that the broad nature of this topic implies that the research presented here is only a smal l sampling of the work being done worldwide. It argues nevertheless th at these seven articles go beyond most in not only attempting to under stand why individuals of certain ethnicities earn less or more than in dividuals from other groups and why men almost universally earn more t han women, but in explaining why such ethnic and gender inequalities c hange over time, and what the role of educational inequality may have to do with these changes. The main contribution of the pieces, therefo re, is in presenting alternative models and empirical data testing the m for analyzing changing ethnic/gender inequalities worldwide. The art icles cover Hong Kong, Israel, Peru, the Republic of Korea and the Uni ted States. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd