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JOBS BEFORE COLLEGE COMPLETION AND CAREER BUILDING OF YOUNG WORKERS THROUGH JOB SWITCHING

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2018

Toshihiko Mukoyama  and
Gang Zhang
Toshihiko Mukoyama
Affiliation:
Georgetown University and University of Virginia
Gang Zhang*
Affiliation:
University of Virginia
*
Address correspondence to: Gang Zhang, Department of Economics, University of Virginia, P.O. Box 400182, Charlottesville, VA 22904-4182, USA; e-mail: [email protected].
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Abstract

We analyze job switching and wage growth of young workers, separately considering the jobs experienced by workers before and after college completion. These two groups of jobs consist of very different occupational compositions. Workers with many jobs before college completion (JBCC) and with little or no job experiences before college completion have similar subsequent wage paths. These facts can be interpreted that JBCC contribute less to career building compared to the ones after college completion. If we disregard all JBCC, the number of jobs that are experienced by workers before age 35 are about three jobs fewer than the total number of jobs.

Keywords

Job MobilityJobs Before College CompletionLife Cycle
Type
Articles
Information
Macroeconomic Dynamics , Volume 23 , Issue 7 , October 2019 , pp. 2892 - 2940
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

We thank an Associate Editor and two anonymous referees for their insightful comments, Dajun Lin and Chris Ruhm for their suggestions, Steve McClaskie for their help on NLSY data, and Nick Embrey for his editorial help. Mukoyama thanks the Bankard Fund for Political Economy for financial support and Zhang thanks the Steer Family Endowed Fund for financial support. All errors are ours.

References

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