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Expansion of schooling and educational inequality in Europe: the educational Kuznets curve revisited

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  • Elena Meschi
  • Francesco Scervini

Abstract

This article analyses the relationship between schooling expansion and educational inequality in a panel of developed countries over different birth cohorts. We extend previous literature by exploiting the longitudinal dimension of our data and by focussing on different measures of inequality. Using either a Gini or a Theil measure of inequality, we find evidence that at higher average levels of education further increases are associated with rising inequality. The inverted-U Kuznets curve appears to depend on using the standard deviation as the measure of inequality. We also discuss how educational policies may influence educational inequality and find that the length of compulsory education affects inequality only through its effect on average education, whilst school tracking shapes inequality independently of the level of education.

Suggested Citation

  • Elena Meschi & Francesco Scervini, 2014. "Expansion of schooling and educational inequality in Europe: the educational Kuznets curve revisited," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 66(3), pages 660-680.
  • Handle: RePEc:oup:oxecpp:v:66:y:2014:i:3:p:660-680.
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/oep/gpt036
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    Cited by:

    1. Vachaspati Shukla & Udaya S. Mishra, 2019. "Educational Expansion and Schooling Inequality: Testing Educational Kuznets Curve for India," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 1265-1283, February.
    2. Flaviana Palmisano & Federico Biagi & Vito Peragine, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity in Tertiary Education: Evidence from Europe," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 63(3), pages 514-565, May.
    3. Aleknavičiūtė Rasa & Skvarciany Viktorija & Survilaitė Simona, 2016. "The Role of Human Capital for National Innovation Capability in Eu Countries," Economics and Culture, Sciendo, vol. 13(1), pages 114-125, June.
    4. Thomas Ziesemer, 2022. "Global Dynamics of Gini Coefficients of Education for 146 Countries: Update to 1950-2015 and a Compact Guide to the Literature," Bulletin of Applied Economics, Risk Market Journals, vol. 9(1), pages 85-95.
    5. Xia, Yin-Shuang & Sun, Lu-Xuan & Feng, Chao, 2022. "What causes spatial inequalities of low-carbon development in China's transport sector? A newly proposed meta-frontier DEA-based decomposition approach," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    6. Klaus Prettner & Andreas Schaefer, 2021. "The U‐Shape of Income Inequality over the 20th Century: The Role of Education," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 123(2), pages 645-675, April.
    7. Gangfei Luo & Shouzhen Zeng & Tomas Baležentis, 2022. "Multidimensional Measurement and Comparison of China’s Educational Inequality," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 163(2), pages 857-874, September.
    8. Guarini, Giulio & Laureti, Tiziana & Garofalo, Giuseppe, 2018. "Territorial and individual educational inequality: A Capability Approach analysis for Italy," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 247-262.
    9. Takahiro Akita, 2023. "Revisiting educational Kuznets curve: An analysis of educational inequality based on absolute and relative inequality measures," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 43(1), pages 1-7.
    10. Checchi, Daniele & van de Werfhorst, Herman Gerbert, 2017. "Policies, Skills and Earnings: How Educational Inequality Affects Earnings Inequality," SocArXiv wn3h2, Center for Open Science.
    11. Elena Meschi & Francesco Scervini, 2014. "A new dataset on educational inequality," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 47(2), pages 695-716, September.
    12. Peng Zhou & Fengwen Chen & Wei Wang & Peixin Song & Chenliang Zhu, 2019. "Does the Development of Information and Communication Technology and Transportation Infrastructure Affect China’s Educational Inequality?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-19, May.
    13. Clifford Afoakwah & Xin Deng & Ilke Onur, 2023. "Reforms and education inequality in Ghana," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(2), pages 853-878, May.
    14. Tharcisio Leone, 2019. "Intergenerational Mobility in Education: Estimates of the Worldwide Variation," Journal of Economic Development, Chung-Ang Unviersity, Department of Economics, vol. 44(4), pages 1-42, December.
    15. Muhammad Shafiullah & Vassilios G. Papavassiliou & Muhammad Shahbaz, 2021. "Is There an Extended Education-Based Environmental Kuznets Curve? An Analysis of U.S. States," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 80(4), pages 795-819, December.
    16. Petra Sauer, 2019. "The Role of Age and Gender in Educational Expansion: The South Asian Experience in the Global Context," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 65(S1), pages 153-181, November.
    17. Justin T. Callais & Vincent Geloso, 2023. "Intergenerational income mobility and economic freedom," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 89(3), pages 732-753, January.
    18. G.A. Diah Utari, 2014. "Growth and Inequality in Indonesia: Does Kuznets Curve Hold?," EcoMod2014 7353, EcoMod.
    19. Takahiro Akita, 2024. "Educational Expansion and Educational Inequality," Working Papers EMS_2024_02, Research Institute, International University of Japan.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality

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