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I think that economics majors end up making more money pretty much because economics majors end up getting employed in areas that manipulate the flow of money. In short, econ majors are more likely than other majors to be involved in the exchange of money. And having that much access to money changes the way you think. It makes you think more strategically and more rationally. It inclines you to value things that can be easily quantified (like cost, income, time) more than things that are not so easily quantified (like happiness, quality of life, and moral motivations). Because you end up thinking more strategically and rationally and really focusing on things that can be easily quantified and therefore more easily assigned a dollar sign, you end up making decisions that get you a higher income.
Additionally, this money aspect is significant for another reason. I strongly believe - (I don't seek to find hard data to support my claim because I believe that theory, thinking, and ideas that associate with trends matter more than the data that I have trouble analyzing and understanding) I strongly believe that if you were to diagram out all occupations based on the occupations' amount of involvement with manipulating and determining monetary value, you would find that these same occupations pay the most. I will bring in a couple of examples. First example, and most obvious: finance, in which you trade stocks and determine the value of stocks, whatever they are. To me, they are just like currency/money, another form of currency/money. Lawyering: in which you both have to argue well but also quantify damages and punitive awards in a court of law. Plus, as a lawyer, you have to run a business and manage the flow and exchange of money between you and your clients. Marketing/accounting/business: in which you have to A) handle and allocate money to advertising campaigns/ B) look for patterns and trends in money allocation and figure out ways to make it more efficient/productive/ C) manage the flow and exchange of money between your organization and outside groups. Now also look at scientific research, IT/Computers, and engineering: from what I recall in my macroecon class, which I did okay in, except for the parts that really involved understanding the exchange of monetary value, technology really boosts economic growth. Macroecon theory says that technology increases the production possibilities frontier, thereby boosting monetary value overall. And scientific research, IT/Computers, and engineering are fields that produce technological innovations, so they are all fields that indirectly create a net increase in monetary value over time.
What about other fields with high incomes, such as plumbing, those successful actors/actresses, well-paid artists, and doctors and surgeons employed in hospitals who don't really need to manage money all that money all that much? I believe that these careers pay a lot precisely because they require a specific acquisition of skills that are very difficult to acquire in the first place. For plumbing, you have to be deft with your hands and very conscientious and willing to work in grimy conditions. To be a successful actor/actress, you must have very very high social intelligence, extremely high empathy, good connections, beauty/good looks, kinesthelogical ability/ability to move your body in an artful and attractive manner... To be a well-paid artist, you must have original ideas that reflect a certain prevailing sentiment specific to your era, manual dexterity, sometimes physical strength for sculpting and abstract art, and a knack for self-promotion. To be a good doctor/surgeon, you need to acquire the whole gamut of scientific knowledge, have empathy and social skills, be adept with physically handling medical equipment, and have strong intuition. In short, these other fields that pay high require lots of physical/kinesthelogical/manual dexterity, may involve high risk, and may require creativity.
But what about everyone else, like waiters/waitresses, teachers, cashiers, low-paid artists, struggling actors, farmers, some skilled industrial laborers, parole officers, beauticians, therapists, day-care workers, miners, factory workers, and liberal arts majors? I believe that these people don't get paid as much as those working in econ/business and those working in other fields because: A) Wall Street investors tend not to invest in these individuals' enterprises, meaning that there is little potential for these individuals' enterprises to really grow a lot because it would difficult to obtain the financial backing necessary for growth. B) These people are much more removed from the exchange, flow, and manipulation of money on the corporate, strategic organizational level. C) The value of these workers' contributions to society are more-so moral in nature, aesthetic in nature, protective in nature, or allowing the firm's strategic/corporate-level workers to continue making their strategic/corporate-level decisions in nature. However, morally-directed, aesthetically-oriented, protectively-focused, and corporate-structure-maintaining organizations benefit society in ways that are harder to quantify or monetize. Therefore, less money is made.
In short, these are my ideas/theories. It would be interesting if these/theories could somehow be tested. This is my take on the issue, really. I just believe it has to do with the proximity to the main task of manipulating money, determining monetary value, and exchanging money, whether Wall Street really wants to invest in your firm, and whether your occupation is by nature easier to quantify through a monetary value.
As far as I'm concerned, I am far more interested in theory/idea than I am in analyzing data and determining value. In fact, all of your correlational analysis and data analysis were rather hard for me to follow. I got the general gist of your ideas though. Maybe if the data was inconclusive with those ideas, could the data be more conclusive with these ideas?
I would be a prospective history major at Vanderbilt, by the way.