THE GENDER EARNINGS GAP AMONG COLLEGE-EDUCATED WORKERS

The gender earnings gap among full-time workers narrowed substantially in the 1980s. Previous research has established that increases in the amount of and returns to work experience and schooling among women we re primarily responsible for that trend. This paper, which uses data f rom the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972 a nd the High School and Beyond Senior Cohort (Class of 1980), examines to what extent college schooling characteristics other than number of years, such as grades and major field, contributed to the narrowing of the gap. Changes in the estimated effects of college grades and colle ge major, the author finds, can account for almost all of the large de cline in the gender earnings gap between 1979 and 1986 among young col lege-educated workers. Most of this effect apparently resulted from gr owth in the market price of women's skills relative to men's for a giv en major.