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Efficiency and Equity of European Education and Training Policies

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Author Info
Ludger Woessmann ()

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Abstract

This paper reviews empirical evidence, especially from Europe, on how education and training policies can be designed to advance both efficiency and equity. Returns to educational investments tend to decrease over the life cycle. Moreover, they seem to be highest for children from disadvantaged families at early stages and for the well-off at late stages of the life cycle. This creates complementarities between efficiency and equity at early stages and trade-offs at late stages. The paper goes on to discuss specific policies for efficiency and equity at each educational stage, ranging from early childhood education and schools over vocational and higher education to training and lifelong learning. The available evidence suggests that both efficiency and equity can be enhanced by output-oriented reforms properly designed to each stage, where the state generally sets a regulatory framework that ensures accountability and funding and uses the forces of choice and competition to deliver best results. Designed this way, education and training systems can advance efficiency and equity at the same time.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by CESifo Group Munich in its series CESifo Working Paper Series with number CESifo Working Paper No. 1779.

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Date of creation: 2006
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Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1779

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Related research
Keywords: education; training; Europe; efficiency; equity; life cycle; trade-off;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
D60 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - General
H52 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Education
I28 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Government Policy
J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Marcel Gérard, 2008. "Financing Bologna, the Internationally Mobile Students in European Higher Education," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
  2. Frank Oskamp & Dennis J. Snower, 2007. "Interactions between Employment and Training Policies," Kiel Working Papers 1389, Kiel Institute for the World Economy. [Downloadable!]
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