233 M.J. Carvajal et al. Economics of Education Review 19 2000 229–243
way in which a population responds to its perception of changing
economic opportunities
Carvajal Upadhiaya, 1986. If indeed people migrate because they
believe that, by doing so, they will improve their con- dition and that of their family, the earnings of recent
graduates who have moved out of the Miami Metropoli- tan Area should exceed, on average, the earnings of those
who have stayed. The data suggest that 90.0 of gradu- ates live in the Miami Metropolitan Area. This estimate,
however, is probably inflated; graduates who have moved away, especially to other states, are more difficult
to locate and, consequently, less likely to be present in the sample. There are no significant inter-gender
location differences.
4. Expectations of students
Betts 1996 and Smith and Powell 1990 point out that since college seniors, near the end of their didactic
training, are on the verge of entering the job market, they may possess more accurate job-related information and
more realistic earnings aspirations vis-a`-vis other stu- dents. In line with such reasoning, this analysis of stu-
dents’ expectations is restricted to seniors. It is based on an initial sample of 362 fourth-year students enrolled in
36 senior-level courses chosen randomly out of a total of 96 senior-level courses offered by the College of Busi-
ness in the Spring 1996 semester.
Most foreign students are precluded from entering the US labor market, and their presence in the sample would
distort the profile of those eligible to compete for jobs after graduation. Thus, this study is limited to the 315
college seniors who are either US citizens or hold resi- dent-alien status; that is, who possess the capability to
work legally.
5
Of these, 248 students 78.7 indicate their intention to work immediately after graduation.
6
They are both willing and able to work; as such, they constitute the sample used for estimating students’
expectations. Here the results of a one-way ANOVA model also
reveal an absence of significant differences a
= 0.10 in
expected earnings among majors. Consequently, follow- ing the guidelines applied to the alumni data set, seniors
5
The presence of foreign students in the sample 13.0 is very similar to the estimated percentage of graduates who do
not reside permanently in the United States.
6
Of the 248 seniors willing and able to work after gradu- ation, 212 85.5 are currently working. Of these, 63.7 hold
a full-time job, 33.0 hold a part-time job i.e., fewer than 30 hours per week, and the remaining 3.3 do not answer. More-
over, 45.2 of seniors who work full-time indicate that they intend to keep their job after graduation. Since these percent-
ages are high, one would anticipate relatively accurate earn- ings expectations.
are treated homogeneously, which increases the robust- ness of the estimates. Men outnumber women 145
58.5 to 103 41.5. Ethnically, Non-Hispanic Whites represent 15.7 of the students’ sample, Blacks
account for 10.9, and Hispanics constitute almost two- thirds 64.9; the remaining 8.5 fall under the classi-
fication of other ethnic groups.
On average, students expect to earn in their first job after graduation 31,782 annually. Mean comparisons
by gender and ethnic group of this and other selected variables are presented in Table 1. Male students expect
to earn 6.3 more than their female peers, the difference being statistically significant. This gap is consistent with
the inter-gender pay differential experienced in the mar- ket by recent graduates.
Table 2 shows the mean ratios, by gender, of values for earnings and other variables anticipated by seniors to
actual values reported by alumni. Expected earnings exceed actual earnings by only 8.4, thus suggesting
that students are well informed about pay in the labor market. This modest overexpectation is similar for
both genders.
Students’ average expected work week is 44.2 hours, close to, but significantly different from, the average
work week reported by recent graduates; there are no significant differences in this variable between men and
women.
7
No inter-gender differences appear in seniors’ reported grade point averages, either, although the over-
all mean value is significantly greater than the alumni’s grade point average mean; this disparity probably reflects
a reporting bias — the value recorded for graduates is the official grade point average, while, in the students’
distribution, the value is reported by the students them- selves. Male and female students show identical age
means 26.0 years, slightly lower than the means of graduates, which one would expect by the nature of
the data.
Table 2 College seniors’ to recent graduates’ mean ratios for selected
variables, by gender Variable
Total Gender
Men Women
Annual earnings 1.084
1.074 1.082
Labor input 1.028
1.047 1.003
Grade point average 1.044
1.055 1.030
Age 0.963
0.936 0.991
7
89.5 of college seniors 89.0 of men, 90.3 of women expect to work at least 40 hours per week, compared to 93.2
of recent graduates 92.7 of men, 93.6 of women who report working at least 40 hours per week.
234 M.J. Carvajal et al. Economics of Education Review 19 2000 229–243
Nearly half 47.2 of seniors expect that their first job after graduation will be with a large firm. Working
in small and medium-sized firms also is a common expectation, followed by government and self-employ-
ment. The overall percentage distribution of type-of- employer expectations is similar to the distribution found
in the market by recent graduates. Unlike the distribution of recent graduates, however, students’ expectations
show significant differences by gender. In relation to their male counterparts, female students anticipate work-
ing in large firms and in the public sector more often, while relatively more male than female students expect
to pursue jobs with small and medium-sized firms, as well as being self-employed; that is, riskier alternatives.
Students’ type-of-job expectations do not conform to market realities. Over two-fifths 41.9 expect to hold
managerial positions, far more than what is available according to recent graduates. Significant inter-gender
differences are limited to the less important type-of-job categories.
About one out of every three 32.7 students sur- veyed expects to leave the Miami Metropolitan Area for
hisher first job. This is a greater percentage than reported by graduates, and the difference may reflect a
downward bias, alluded earlier, in locating persons mov- ing out of state after graduation. As with recent gradu-
ates, there are no significant inter-gender differences in expectation to migrate.
5. General earnings functions
