If you had a teacher who handed out "easy As," you're probably making significantly less money right now.
SSRN · March 18, 2026 · 6425004
The Takeaway
While grade inflation makes it easier to graduate, it appears to reduce actual cognitive skill development and long-term test scores. A single year with a teacher who grades too leniently can reduce a student's projected lifetime earnings by over $213,000 compared to a teacher with more rigorous standards.
From the abstract
Average grades continue to rise in the United States, raising the question of how grade inflation impacts students. We provide comprehensive evidence on how teacher grading practices affect students' long-run success. Using administrative high school data from Los Angeles and from Maryland that is linked to postsecondary and earnings records, we develop and validate two teacher-level measures of grade inflation: one measuring average grade inflation and another measuring a teacher's pr