In this paper, we estimate and compare the returns to education in Australia using standard Mincer equations for the years 2006, 2011, and 2016. Data used for the analysis is the most recently released Household Income and Labour Dynamics of Australia (HILDA) survey (version 16). In addition, we also examine whether the family background in which an individual grows up may affect his/her earning.

The rest of the document is as follows. We first describe the approach, and then describe the data. We then present and discuss the results, and then make some conclusions. The Full results are presented in an Appendix.