What is it about?
This is a review article on the concept of overeducation, the theories to explain its appearance and duration, followed by a review of the empirical evidence provided from the fields of economics and sociology. Overeducation has been traditionally addressed from the economics literature and the main focus has been on wage returns and the use of extra years of education. However, from a sociological perspective the focus has been addressed on overeducation as a form of social stratification affecting individuals and education systems to different extents.
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Why is it important?
The overeducation literature was initiated by labour economists and the focus was mainly of wage returns to extra years of education. However, beyond the effect that overeducation can have on wages there are other consequences on job satisfaction, social position and status. Combining the contributions from economics and sociology to the overeducation literature provides us a richer academic perspectives, opening interdisciplinary debates and new lines of research.
Perspectives
This review article is going to be useful for students, scholars and policy makers who are looking for a revision on what the literature understands as overeducation, which are the theories that have tried to explain tis occurrence and duration and which is the empirical evidence provided on the topic from the economics and sociology fields.
Queralt Capsada-Munsech
University of Glasgow
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Overeducation: Concept, theories, and empirical evidence, Sociology Compass, September 2017, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12518.
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