Gender, income and racial inequality in higher education: trajectories, social networks and early labor market outcomes

• Grant number: 23/17913-0
• Support Opportunities: Research Grants - Young Investigators Grants
• Start date: September 01, 2024
• End date: August 31, 2029
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Economics - Social Welfare Economics
• Principal Investigator: Ursula Mattioli Mello
• Grantee: Ursula Mattioli Mello
• Host Institution: Instituto de Ensino e Pesquisa (Insper). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Cristine Campos de Xavier Pinto ; Naercio Aquino Menezes Filho
• Associated scholarship(s): 25/03932-9 - Shocks in the Labor Market and Higher Education Dropout, BP.DD; 25/04713-9 - Outside Options, Higher Education Pathways and Labor Market Returns, BP.DD; 24/20531-5 - Concentration Shocks in the Labor Market and Response Differentials by Occupational Hierarchy, BP.DD; 24/20542-7 - Encouragement, Information and Inequality in Access to Higher Education, BP.DD; 24/17858-2 - Assistance in collecting primary data from higher education graduates and econometric analysis in a research project on Inequality in Higher Education, BP.TT

Abstract

A growing body of the economic literature has investigated how colleges perpetuate or mitigate inequality within and across generations and groups, and how higher education policies can combat such inequality. Yet, many open questions remain and motivate the research agenda outlined in this proposal. The broad goals of this project are to (i) advance our knowledge of the extent and the drivers of gender, income, and racial inequality in higher education, with a focus on students' trajectories after college enrollment and on the transition to the labor market; (ii) understand the heterogeneous role of social networks formed during university for job finding and early career success with a focus on elite programs; and (iii) investigate how the expansion of affirmative action quotas targeted at low-income non-white individuals impact social networks and the profile and behavior of society's entrepreneurs. We will build an original and ambitious dataset by combining different sources of data on the universe of first- year college students from 2010 to 2015. We will construct individual-level trajectories and follow students from the first year of college until their early years in the labor market. The project will give rise to at least three academic publications and to a public dataset containing key indicators for the monitoring and evaluation of the Brazilian higher education system. (AU)