This repo contains the data and code for FiveThirtyEight's story on earnings of college majors. All data is from American Community Survey 2010-2012 Public Use Microdata Series.
Download data here: http://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/data/pums.html
Documentation here: http://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/technical-documentation/pums.html
college-majors-rscript.R:
- My R script for parsing the data.
- Assumes you've already downloaded the data and selected only records with non-NA values for college major (FOD1P)
- Outputs data to csv
majors-list.csv:
- List of majors with their FOD1P codes and major categories.
- Major categories are from Carnevale et al, "What's It Worth?: The Economic Value of College Majors." Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, 2011. http://cew.georgetown.edu/whatsitworth
Three main data files:
- all-ages.csv
- recent-grads.csv (ages <28)
- grad-students.csv (ages 25+) All contain basic earnings and labor force information. recent-grads contains more detailed breakdown, including by sex and by the type of job they got. Full headers below. grad-students contains details on graduate school attendees.
Additionally, women-stem.csv contains data for scatter plot in associated DataLab post on women in science/technology jobs. It is a subset of recent-grads.csv. (Small easter egg: Check out my related Shiny app: https://bencasselman.shinyapps.io/new-test/)
Headers for recent-grads.csv
| Header | Description |
|---|---|
Rank |
Rank by median earnings |
Major_code |
Major code, FO1DP in ACS PUMS |
Major |
Major description |
Major_category |
Category of major from Carnevale et al |
Total |
Total number of people with major |
Sample_size |
Sample size (unweighted) of full-time, year-round ONLY (used for earnings) |
Men |
Male graduates |
Women |
Female graduates |
ShareWomen |
Women as share of total |
Employed |
Number employed (ESR == 1 or 2) |
Full_time |
Employed 35 hours or more |
Part_time |
Employed less than 35 hours |
Full_time_year_round |
Employed at least 50 weeks (WKW == 1) and at least 35 hours (WKHP >= 35) |
Unemployed |
Number unemployed (ESR == 3) |
Unemployment_rate |
Unemployed / (Unemployed + Employed) |
Median |
Median earnings of full-time, year-round workers |
P25th |
25th percentile of earnigns |
P75th |
75th percentile of earnings |
College_jobs |
Number with job requiring a college degree |
Non_college_jobs |
Number with job not requiring a college degree |
Low_wage_jobs |
Number in low-wage service jobs |