How English domiciled graduate earnings vary with gender, institution attended, subject and socio-economic background

Abstract

This paper uses tax and student loan administrative data to measure how the earnings of English graduates around 10 years into the labour market vary with gender, institution attended, subject and socioeconomic background. The English system is competitive to enter, with some universities demanding very high entrance grades. Students specialise early, nominating their subject before they enter higher education (HE). We find subjects like Medicine, Economics, Law, Maths and Business deliver substantial premiums over typical graduates, while disappointingly, Creative Arts delivers earnings which are roughly typical of non-graduates. Considerable variation in earnings is observed across different institutions. Much of this is explained by student background and subject mix. Based on a simple measure of parental income, we see that students from higher income families have median earnings which are around 25% more than those from lower income families. Once we control for institution attended and subject chosen, this premium falls to around 10%.

Online and Distance Education for a Connected World

“…However, this involves using a measure of employment as a proxy for measuring employability. Employment outcomes are influenced by a wide range of individual and market factors alongside institutional efforts to develop student employability (Britton et al, 2016). When using employment outcomes as a measure of employability development it is important to be clear about what constitutes a successful outcome.…”

“…The ESE focuses seven factors of student self-evaluation: , 2018). This approach to employability seems to be particularly applicable to a strategic aim of addressing inequalities in graduate outcomes linked to socioeconomic differences (Britton et al, 2016;Mountford-Zimdars et al, 2015). As distance learning plays an important part in widening access to HE for non-traditional students, the development of individual capital could be a major consideration for employability in this context.…”

Cutting the STEM of future skills: beyond the STEM vs art dichotomy in England

“…The economic link between STEM and the lower earnings of those who study the Creative Arts was highlighted by Britton et al, in 2016 (5 years after the EBacc was introduced), using a national data set. Summarising the results of their research into the link between subjects studied and subsequent earnings they state, "We find subjects like Medicine, Economics, Law, Maths and Business deliver substantial premiums over typical graduates, while disappointingly, Creative Arts delivers earnings which are roughly typical of non-graduates."…”

Lower income students and the ‘double deficit’ of part-time work: undergraduate experiences of finance, studying and employability

“…Given these opportunities are likely to go to the most economically networked, he goes on to provide empirical evidence to suggest that this push toward employability merely reinforces existing inequalities (see also Knight & Yorke 2004; Stevenson & Clegg 2011; Greenbank 2015). Britton, Crawford & Dearden (2015) have similarly provided evidence that the graduate premium still exists, and there are increasingly wide disparities emerging between gender, ethnicity, institution, and subject (Zwysen & Longhi 2017, Britton et al 2016. Perhaps most pertinently, whilst graduates from lower and higher income households do earn more than non-graduates, those from higher income brackets continue to earn more than their lower income counterparts.…”