Does acquisition of a GED lead to more training, post-secondary education, and military service for school dropouts?

This paper uses longitudinal data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to examine whether acquisition of a GED increases the probability that male and female school dropouts obtain training, post-secondary education, or military service. Random effects probit models are used to account for both the dichotomous nature of the dependent variables and non-zero correlations among error terms pertaining to different years of data for the same individual. We find that acquisition of a GED increases the probability that school dropouts obtain post-secondary education and the probability that they obtain non-company training, defined as training provided by government or by proprietary schools. However, it is still the case that the majority of GED recipients obtain no post-secondary education or training through the age of 26.