College Majors and Skills: Evidence from the Universe of Online Job Ads

Arbeitspapier

We document the skill content of college majors as perceived by employers and expressed in the near universe of U.S. online job ads. Social and organizational skills are general in that they are sought by employers of almost all college majors, whereas other skills are more specialized. In turn, general majors––Business and General Engineering––have skill profiles similar to all majors; Nursing and Education are specialized. These cross-major differences in skill profiles explain considerable wage variation, with little role for within-major differences in skills across areas. College majors can thus be reasonably conceptualized as portable bundles of skills.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 14964

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Returns to Education ; Labor Demand ; Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
• Subject: college major ; skill demand

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Hemelt, Steven W. ; Hershbein, Brad J. ; Martin, Shawn ; Stange, Kevin
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2021

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/250625
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET