Authors :
Opeyeoluwa Daniel Alade
Volume/Issue :
Volume 10 - 2025, Issue 9 - September
Google Scholar :
https://tinyurl.com/yat9k7p6
Scribd :
https://tinyurl.com/2ttdpzjd
DOI :
https://doi.org/10.38124/ijisrt/25sep679
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Abstract :
This paper looks at how education, sex, hours worked, occupational prestige, and type of job (government or private)
relate to people's income. Using data from the General Social Survey (GSS), we used Stata to run different types of analysis,
including descriptive, bivariate, multivariate, moderation, mediation, and prediction. Our results showed that education has a
strong positive effect on income. Hours worked and occupational prestige also increase income, while being female is linked to
lower income compared to males. Working in the government or private sector did not have a big impact. We also found that
hours worked partly explains how education affects income (mediation), and that sex slightly changes the strength of the
education-income link (moderation). These findings gives us better understanding of the factors that shape people's earnings in
the United States.
Keywords :
Income, Education, Occupational Prestige, Hours Worked, Sex, Social Inequality.
References :
- Checchi, D. (2006). The economics of education: Human capital, family background and inequality. Cambridge University Press.
- Carnevale, A. P., Rose, S. J., & Cheah, B. (2011). The college payoff: Education, occupations, lifetime earnings. Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. https://cew.georgetown.edu/cew-reports/the-college-payoff/
- Day, J. C., & Newburger, E. C. (2002). The big payoff: Educational attainment and synthetic estimates of work-life earnings (No. 394). US Department of Commerce, Economics and Statistics Administration, US Census Bureau.
- Duncan, O. D. (1961). A socioeconomic index for all occupations. In A. J. Reiss Jr. (Ed.), Occupations and social status (pp. 109–138). Free Press.
- Gibbs, B. G., & Griffin, C. B. (2013). What do we know about social class and health inequalities? Sociology Compass, 7(6), 479–491. https://doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12043
- Hauser, R. M., & Warren, J. R. (1997). Socioeconomic indexes for occupations: A review, update, and critique. Sociological Methodology, 27(1), 177–298. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9531.271028
- National Opinion Research Center. (2022). General Social Survey [Data set]. NORC at the University of Chicago. Retrieved from https://gss.norc.org
- Sirin, S. R. (2005). Socioeconomic status and academic achievement: A meta-analytic review of research. Review of Educational Research, 75(3), 417–453. https://doi.org/10.3102/00346543075003417
- Sørensen, A. B. (2000). Toward a sounder basis for class analysis. American Journal of Sociology, 105(6), 1523–1558. https://doi.org/10.1086/210466
- Torche, F. (2011). Is a college degree still the great equalizer? Intergenerational mobility across levels of schooling in the United States. American Journal of Sociology, 117(3), 763–807. https://doi.org/10.1086/661904
This paper looks at how education, sex, hours worked, occupational prestige, and type of job (government or private)
relate to people's income. Using data from the General Social Survey (GSS), we used Stata to run different types of analysis,
including descriptive, bivariate, multivariate, moderation, mediation, and prediction. Our results showed that education has a
strong positive effect on income. Hours worked and occupational prestige also increase income, while being female is linked to
lower income compared to males. Working in the government or private sector did not have a big impact. We also found that
hours worked partly explains how education affects income (mediation), and that sex slightly changes the strength of the
education-income link (moderation). These findings gives us better understanding of the factors that shape people's earnings in
the United States.
Keywords :
Income, Education, Occupational Prestige, Hours Worked, Sex, Social Inequality.