This study analyzes how worker pay is related to educational diversity, i.e., diversity in the educational composition of work groups in terms of the different types of vocational and academic education. As previous research shows that various types of diversity have positive effects in the workplace, a positive effect due to ‘educational diversity’ also seems plausible. We provide novel empirical evidence on the relation between the educational diversity of work groups and productivity, or more precisely, individual workers’ pay. Using theoretical considerations drawn from diversity research, we develop hypotheses on the relation between a group’s educational diversity and individual workers’ pay. Drawing on an exceptionally large set of employer-employee data with more than 87,000 employers and 1,200,000 employees, we test our hypotheses and find that the educational diversity of work groups—and thus work groups with workers of different types of vocational and academic education—is positively related to individual workers’ pay. Thus, educational diversity in the form of a combination of academic and Vocational Education and Training (VET) graduates in the workplace seems to be advantageous for the workers involved. Our findings suggest that educational diversity is especially beneficial in groups with high levels of task complexity and shorter organizational tenure.

这项研究分析了工人工资如何与教育多样性相关，即就职业和学术教育的不同类型而言，工作组的教育组成的多样性。正如先前的研究表明，各种类型的多样性在工作场所均具有积极作用，这归因于“教育多样性”似乎也很合理。我们提供了有关工作组的教育多样性与生产力，或更确切地说，个体工人的工资之间的关系的新颖的经验证据。利用从多样性研究中得出的理论考虑，我们提出了关于群体的教育多样性与个体工人工资之间关系的假设。利用拥有87,000多名雇主和1,200,000名员工的庞大的雇主-雇员数据集，我们检验了我们的假设，发现工作组的教育多样性（以及因此而接受不同职业和学术教育的工人组成的工作组）是与单个工人的工资成正比。从而，结合工作场所的学术和职业教育与培训（VET）毕业生形式的教育多样性似乎对所涉工人有利。我们的研究结果表明，教育多样性对于任务复杂程度高且组织任职时间短的群体尤其有益。