Education, Gender, and Work in Explaining Income Inequality


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 :

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  2. 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/
  3. 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.
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  7. National Opinion Research Center. (2022). General Social Survey [Data set]. NORC at the University of Chicago. Retrieved from https://gss.norc.org
  8. 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
  9. 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
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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.

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Paper Submission Last Date
31 - December - 2025

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