Overqualification of Graduates: Assessing the Role of Family Background

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Abstract Overqualification signals a mismatch between jobs' educational requirements and workers' qualifications implying potential productivity losses at the macro and the micro level. This study explores how the family background of German graduates affects the probability to hold a job that does not require tertiary education, i.e. to be overqualified. Potential pathways of the family background effects are discussed and proxy variables for the mediating factors ability and skills, study characteristics, social capital, financial capital, and aspiration are incorporated into the empirical analysis. Graduates from high status families are found to be less likely to be overqualified. The unconditional social overqualification gap amounts to 7.4 percentage points. Blinder-Oaxaca decompositions of the overqualification gap show that differences in ability and skills, study characteristics, and social capital are important mediators of the family background effects. Terms of use: Documents in

Dynamics of Overqualification: Evidence from the Early Career of Graduates

“…However, the significant negative effect of the initial overqualification experience increases considerably illustrating the high relevance of study characteristics and ability for the selection into early overqualification. Furthermore, the effect of parental education increases and becomes significant signalling that these individual characteristics are relevant pathways for family background effects on overqualification (Erdsiek, 2016).…”

“…The family background of graduates may also affect the probability to find an adequate job at the outset of the career cycle (Erdsiek, 2016). As a proxy for various forms of capital transmitted within families, I include a dummy variable into the analysis indicating whether at least one of the graduate's parents obtained a tertiary degree.…”

Social Capital and Its Effect on Labour Market (Mis)match: Migrants’ Overqualification in Germany

“…Accordingly, investments in education cannot be entirely utilised and converted into appropriate returns. The risk of being overqualified varies based on diverse determinants such as gender, social background, and, as previously outlined, migration background (Battu & Sloane, 2004;Erdsiek, 2016;Joona et al, 2014;Kracke, 2016). Therefore, the consequences of overqualification are concentrated on certain social groups and (re-)produce social inequalities in societies.…”

Human capital and returns to education

“…A further point explored in the literature is the link between family background and overqualification. The empirical analysis shows that graduates from high status families are found to be less likely to be overqualified (Erdsiek, 2016).…”

“…Subjective measures are based on self-reports provided by the workers themselves about some personal and job-related characteristics and on the rate of skill utilisation. Examples on the application of these measures are found in Dolton and Silles (2008), Dolton and Vignoles (2000), Erdsiek (2016), Foley and Brinkley (2015), Holmes and Mayhew (2015), Iammarino and Marinelli (2015), Johnes (2016), Rumberger (1987) and Sicherman (1991).…”