Educational expansion, fields of study, and the gender gap in analytic skill usage on the job

Abstract

This study investigates how higher education expansion changes gender gaps in analytic skill usage on the job in the United States, and its variation across fields of study at the bachelor’s degree level. The present study proposes two patterns for graduates of a given field: One where educational expansion reinforces gender gaps, and another where it dissolves them. Using data from four different cohort studies, we find that educational expansion leads to less analytic skill usage at the bachelor’s degree level. However, this is not universally true, and educational expansion produces very different effects by gender and field of study. Thus, while multiple theories about educational expansion and majors explain these patterns, the specific applicability of them depends on the field of study itself.