What Drives Labor Supply Among U.S. Undergraduates?
(2010-11) Today’s college enrollees are more likely to work, and work more,than those of the past. CPS data reveal that between 1970 and 2003, average labor supply among 18 to 22 year old full-time, four-year undergraduates nearly doubled, from 5.0 hours to 9.6 hours per week. An immediate concern is that this increase may reflect tightening financial constraints. Unless student employment has other benefits, students would be better off borrowing money instead of spending time working, so that they could finish college faster or better. But if students’ ability to borrow is not rising as fast as college costs, they may have little choice but to work. This in turn may delay or diminish their acquisition of human capital, thus decreasing the return on their educational investment. When broadly defined to include “fuzzy” constraints on borrowing for discretionary consumption as well as self-imposed constraints on borrowing, credit constraints appear to be driving the trend even among hig
