This study was conducted to explore the relationship between participation in secondary marketing and distributive education (MDE) and economic attainment after high school. Specifically, the study sought to develop a model of economic attainment, i.e., job status attainment, unemployment, and wages for secondary MDE students. The study used the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972 as the database. Two subsamples were used: the first subsample was of 1,118 students identified as MDE students; the second subsample was of 3,500 workers employed in marketing-related occupations in 1979. Path analysis was used to explore the association between secondary MDE and socioeconomic attainment. The results showed that both MDE participation and cooperative education participation had positive, significant relationships with job status attainment in marketing. Also positively affecting job status attainment in marketing was being male, obtaining higher education, mother's educational level, higher grade point average, and the size of the community where the respondent went to high school. No effect was found for race. It was concluded that participation in MDE and cooperative education enhanced the attainment of job status in marketing. However, the model created in the study showed that 86 percent of the explanation of the variance in job status attainment in marketing came from factors outside the model. Thus, MDE and cooperative education explain only a small part of this complex process. (KC)