




































BECE. Newsletter 

Vol.6, No.2, 2020 881 

 

 

 

 

From Universities to Elite Universities: Heterogeneous 

Returns to Higher Education and the Sorting Mecha-

nism in the Context of Higher Education Expansion in 

China 

By Zhou, Y. & Xie, Y. 

Correspondence to: Xie, Y. Email: ihss@pku.edu.cn 

ITH the popularization of higher education, the viewpoint of “aca-

demic qualification is useless” begins to rise. There is still a contro-

versial debate that accesses to higher education increases return on income, 

and what are the mechanisms by which education affects return on income? 

In fact, there may be strong “heterogeneity” within the sample, that is, differ-

ences not only in higher education but also in other factors affecting income 

between individuals and groups. A survey published in Educational Re-

search, using baseline data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) as a 

database, constructed the following regression mode: 

 The logarithm of the income in the year (2010) of the sampling 

data collection was taken as the dependent variables, and control 

variables such as gender and age were included. Because the so-

cial stratification structure brought by higher education is obvi-

ously different before and after the enrollment expansion policy 

for higher education, the sample group is divided into pre-

enrollment and post-enrollment. 

 The core intervention variable is the type of higher education, 

which is divided into non-university education, non-key universi-

ty education, and key university education. That is to say, the 

sample group includes high school groups, non-key university 

groups, and key university groups. 

 In order to control the selection bias of the samples, an interven-

tion model was established to estimate the predisposition weight 

of each sample to select three types of higher education. Based on 

the weights obtained, the resulting model is constructed, and the 

improved Mincer income function is used to estimate the impact 

of higher education on income return. 

The results are as following: 

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Vol.6, No.2, 2020 882 

 Before the higher education expansion, there was no significant 

difference in the returns to high education between key universi-

ties and non-key universities, but both of them had earnings much 

higher than those with senior high school education. In other 

words, the higher education selection in the elite education stage 

has become the “stepping stone” to enter the higher income group. 

 After the enrollment expansion, the marginal income of key uni-

versities is significantly higher than that of non-key universities, 

but the difference in marginal income between the labor force in 

non-key universities and senior high schools is no longer signifi-

cant. That is to say, key universities continue to play the role of 

“screening elite”, while non-key universities have seen the trans-

formation of higher education from elitist education to popular 

education. 

This empirical study finds that higher education influences income re-

turns through opportunity scarcity and achieves social stratification. Before 

the enrollment expansion policy for higher education, the scarcity mainly ex-

isted between universities and high schools, but after the enrollment expan-

sion, the scarcity existed between key universities and other academic quali-

fications. After the analysis of heterogeneity, this study points out the inevi-

table structural changes brought about by the popularization of higher educa-

tion and demonstrates the functions of elite universities in key universities. 

 

Source: Educational Research, 2020; 41(5):86-98. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 


