Post-Baccalaureate Wage in the Russian Labor Market: The Effect of University Major

The influence of education on lifetime earnings is one of the most discussed topics in empirical research. In providing empirical analysis on this issue, the study has primarily focused on years of schooling, but not on the university majors chosen by individuals. This paper examines the impact of an academic major on earnings and the match of acquired education to the labor market using the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey data (RLMS HSE). In particular, the wage gap across graduates in fields of management and economics, natural sciences and engineering, humanities, and education is estimated by the implementation of Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition. To consider possible self-selection in the labor force the Heckman standard model is assessed for graduates in each major. The results demonstrate that earnings vary significantly by a graduates’ academic major with the highest market labor return for graduates in natural sciences and engineering majors. The findings of this paper contribute to understanding the growth of horizontal stratification in education.