Who gets a better job? Comparing the employability of public and private university graduates in Spain

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyse the differences in employability among Spanish graduates from public or private universities. Private and public universities do not usually have the same profile. In a scenario in which private universities are becoming increasingly important, with mainly high-income students, a greater employability of their graduates could change the higher education system and reduce the role of tertiary education in social mobility. To assess whether the outcomes of the two university models are different, we use Probit models and Inverse Probability Weighting Regression Adjustment (IPWRA) to analyse the probability of being employed, suffering job mismatch, or having higher wages with micro-data from a representative sample of Spanish graduates. We do not find large differences in employability between graduates of public and private universities. The small differences we see concern, generally, degrees in Social Sciences and are related to job quality. There is also evidence that the socioeconomic background of the graduate has different effects on students from public and private universities. Graduates from private universities of more disadvantaged backgrounds have a certain advantage in terms of their employability.