Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/111536 
Year of Publication: 
2015
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 9080
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We consider the effects of student ability, college quality, and the interaction between the two on academic outcomes and future earnings. Both ability and college quality strongly improve outcomes and earnings. We find little evidence to support the "mismatch" hypothesis that college quality and ability interact in substantively important ways. All students benefit from attending higher quality colleges. Our estimates imply that resorting students to eliminate mismatch, without changing the capacity of any colleges, would raise expected graduation rates by only 0.6 percentage points and mean earnings by $400 per year. The substantial gains for students who move to higher quality colleges under this reshuffling roughly cancel out the losses of students who move down.
Subjects: 
college quality
mismatch
JEL: 
I21
J31
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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