Horizontal Advantage: Choice of Postsecondary Field of Study Among Children of Immigrants

Educational expansion has raised the influence of sorting across post sec-ondary educational fields on children's future life chances. Yet, little is known about horizontal ethnic strati fi cation in the choice of field of study among children of immi-grant parents, whose parents often have moderate absolute levels of education relative to native-born parents but tend to be positively selected on education relative to non--migrants in the origin country. Using rich administrative data from Norway, we study the educational careers of immigrant descendants relative to the careers of children of native-born parents. Our results show that children of immigrants from non -European countries have a higher like li hood of entering higher education and enrolling in high--paying fields of study compared with children of natives, despite having poorer school grades and dis advantaged family backgrounds. However, immigrant parents' posi-tive selectivity pro vi des limited insight into why children of immigrants exhibit high ambitions later in their post secondary educational careers. These findings document a per sis tent pattern of horizontal ethnic advantage in post secondary education in which ambitious children of immigrants are more likely to enter into more prestigious and eco-nomically rewarding fields of study than their fellow students with native--born parents.