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Ariell Zimran |
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with William J. Collins NBER Working Paper 32774 Revisions requested by Explorations in Economic History We use the newly released complete-count 1950 US census to study the impacts of World War II service and access to GI Bill benefits on the educational and labor market outcomes of individuals of various ethnic and racial groups. We address selection into military service directly by linking veterans and nonveterans from 1950’s census records to the complete-count 1940 census. We find that veterans were positively selected on the basis of education, and neutrally or negatively selected on the basis of their own or their fathers’ labor market characteristics. We show that selection and differences in selection across groups can be dramatically reduced by using 1940 controls. Controlling for these characteristics in comparing veterans’ and nonveterans’ education and labor market outcomes in 1950, we find modest positive impacts of World War II service and the GI Bill on educational attainment of those with the least pre-war education, and on the school attendance of those with the most pre-war education, with no effect evident for college completion. These effects are relatively large for black men. We find mixed effects on labor market outcomes: young veterans enjoyed slight gains in income and occupational status relative to nonveterans, while older veterans did not. We do not find systematic racial or ethnic differences in the labor market impacts of World War II service and the GI Bill. These findings are important given the continued salience of the GI Bill and its potentially disparate outcomes in modern political discourse. |