- The findings fall under three categories; socioeconomic status (SES), racial density, this refers to the number of people of a particular race in a defined jurisdiction, in relation to the size of the area that they occupy, and racial diversity, this refers to the representation of different racial groups.
- School SES: All else being equal, attending a school with a higher mean SES results in higher earnings (b = 0.040). School SES has a significant interaction with students’ race. School SES has a larger effect on the earnings of Native Americans, Hispanics, and Black students than Whites. However, Whites have an insignificant main effect, indicating the school SES has no impact on the future earnings of White students.
- School Racial Density: The percentage of White students in the student body has a negative effect (b = -0.013) but is not significant on earnings. The authors note that in other models, this insignificance is explained by the strong relationship between racial density and school SES.
- School Racial Diversity: Positively related to students’ future income (b = 0.105). School racial diversity significantly interacts with students’ race. School racial diversity has a larger effect on Hispanics than Whites. As with school SES, the main effect for Whites is non-significant, indicating that racial diversity of the school does not have an impact on future earnings of white students.