The Contribution of Education to Human Resource: An Input-Output Analysis of the Indian Economy

Education is that service which has manifold effects on the provider, the state, the receiver, the individual, his family and the environment, the society. This important position of education has become a topic of research for quite sometime now. The contribution has been measured by economists using (i) bi-variate regression-correlation analysis of linking education to income, GDP, productivity etc.; (ii) rate of return analysis; and (iii) input-output linkage effect measured using Leontief’s inverse. The first two methods have been under the cloud of criticism on methodological and data availability, but the input-output analysis has been very rarely used. This paper is an attempt to measure the linkage effects in India over four enumeration years from 1983-84 to 1998-99. This linkage analysis which includes the direct, total and residentiary for a long period enables temporal analysis of the changes that have moulded the sector post-independence and during the globalization era. It has been found that the sector has been undergoing positive changes over the period and has been contributing to each and every sector of the economy.