Discusses three characteristics of educational systems that have been used to explain social stratification processes: stratification, standardization, and vocational specificity. Describes how these characteristics affect the movement of students through school and into the labor force in France, Germany, Great Britain, and the United States.…

Compares the degree to which educational attainment and cognitive skill explain labor force outcomes, both in occupational status and earnings. Reveals that educational attainment and cognitive skill contribute independently in subsamples of whites, blacks, and Hispanics but in different ways and degrees. Includes references. (CMK)

Analyzes recent occupational data and suggests that postsecondary educational credentials have varied effects on early-labor-force outcomes. Some credentials have greater value in the labor force than does an associate's degree, and their effects often differ for young men and for young women. Argues that this important data has often been…

Examines the reform in England and Wales that changed the secondary school system from a selective to a comprehensive type during the period 1965-74. Discusses middle class resistance to this change. Analyzes enrollment patterns to show how the middle class retained an advantage even as the schools changed. (MJP)

The five-stage multivariate "Wisconsin model" was used to explain comparative educational and occupational attainment of blacks and whites in a sample of boys studied in 1969 and again in 1974. Socioeconomic status has little explanatory power for blacks. Ambition and high school performance are stronger predictors of attainment for blacks than…

A systematic comparison is presented of the reports by school age boys of their parents' educational level and their fathers' occupations with the reports of these same characteristics by the parents. (Author)