Research Discussion Paper – RDP 2021-06 What Is Driving Participation and Diversity Trends in Economics? A Survey of High School Students

Contents

• Introduction
• Data
• Empirical Approach and Results
• Discussion and Implications
• Conclusion
• Appendix A : Sample Characteristics
• Appendix B : Selection Model Results
• References

We are especially grateful to Jacqui Dwyer who has provided guidance throughout all stages of survey design, implementation, analysis and reporting. Similarly, we are thankful to Ipsos for their professional survey design and implementation. This paper has benefited greatly from detailed thoughtful comments from Benjamin Beckers, Adam Gorajek, John Romalis and John Simon. We also thank Gabrielle Penrose for guidance on the analysis, and members of the Reserve Bank of Australia's Educators Advisory Panel and Susan Slocum for input into the survey design. Permission to survey students was provided by the NSW Department of Education (through the State Education Research Applications Process) and eight Catholic diocesan authorities within New South Wales; while formal permission was not required, a letter of support was provided by the Association of Independent Schools of New South Wales Limited. Ethics approval (by a Bellberry Limited Human Research Ethics Committee) was obtained to administer the survey. We are also grateful to NSW Education Standards Authority for providing administrative enrolments data. Our code and the survey questionnaire are available in the online supplementary information accompanying this paper. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Reserve Bank of Australia. The authors are solely responsible for any errors.