A Study On The Effects Of The Expansion Of Higher Education On Employment And Wage In China

What effects will the expansion of Higher Education (HE) would have on thelabor market? It's an interesting and meaningful area for researchers, which is also animportant issue both in labor economics and educational economics. This dissertationwill analysis how the expansion of higher education effect the employment and wageof the labor market.An analysis frame is established mainly with the Labor Supply and DemandTheory, the Labor Market Segmentation Theory and the Human Capital Theory. It' sthought that the expansion of HE would push pressure on the employment on primarymarket given the large surplus of graduates supply compared with the demand tograduates, which is regarded as the effect of employment. And the start wage ofgraduates would be pulled down followed by the decline of private return to HE,which is called "pull effects".The employment and wage of graduates after the expansion of HE is discussedusing the data of survey on graduate. Several econometric models are established toanalysis the main factors that effect the employment and start wage of graduatequantitatively. It is found that the possibility of employment of graduates beforegraduation is significantly determined by the vocation orientation, the choice of majorand the degree, etc. The trends of the development of employment and wage ofgraduates are discussed too. The private returns of HE in China during 1991 to 2004are computed by the Mincer Human Capita Investment Equation using the dataof 'China Economic, Population, Nutrition, and Health Survey' (CHNS). It's foundthat the return to HE ascends quickly in 90's. But the return to HE began to declineafter 2000 accompanied with the fast expansion of HE. So, it is proved the hypothesisthat the private return to HE would decline or stop to ascend after the expansion ofHE.Using the data of CHNS, the character of segmentation of Chinese labor market and its influences on employment and wage are analyzed positively. The segmentationof the labor market in China is so serious that the type of labor market and sectionwhich the graduates first enter determines the total income of all life of them. So thegraduates have strong preference to the type of sections. It's proved that the graduateswould be more satisfyed with their job when they are employed in the regular sectionand eastern large cities. The graduates value the job search, make use of informermethod of search frequently, and search in a long period with much cost.The experiences of different country in dealing with the relationships betweenexpansion of HE and the labor market. Series of policies are provided in the end ofthe article to coordinate the expansion of HE and the labor market. It's argued that thegoal of mass HE should be balanced with the goal of full employment, the reformshould be carried out and the employment promotion policies should be established.The preference of graduates in employment only can be weakened by decrease theextent of segmentation of labor market.