Contrary to expectations, the likelihood of overeducation is shown to be inversely related to unemployment rates when not control for selectivity. Furthermore, incidence data show that overeducation is more common among men than women and among Whites than Blacks. At issue is selectivity: employment must be selected for overeducation to occur. When using bivariate probit with sample selection models, the likelihood of overeducation is found to be positively related to local unemployment rates, higher for women than men, higher for mothers of young children than other women, and lower for fathers than other males. Race, not speaking English very well, and having a disability are found to have a greater impact on the likelihood of overeducation than incidence data suggest.