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GINI DP 61: Expansion of Schooling and Educational Inequality in Europe: Educational Kuznets Curve Revisited

Author

Listed:
  • Elena Meschi

    (Institute of Education ,Room 405, University of London)

  • Francesco Scervini

    (Collegio Carlo Alberto, Università degli Studi, Torino)

Abstract

This paper analyses the relationship between schooling expansion and educational inequality in a panel of developed countries over different birth cohorts. Compared to previous literature, we expand the comprehension of this relationship by exploiting the longitudinal dimension of our data and by focusing on different measures of inequality. We find evidence of a non-linear relationship between expansion and inequality of education and we argue that this evidence is complementary and not necessarily in contrast with the educational Kuznets curve found by previous studies. We also discuss how educational policies may influence educational inequality and we find that the length of compulsory education affects inequality only through its effect on average education, while school tracking shapes inequality independently of the level of education. JEL codes: I21, I24

Suggested Citation

  • Elena Meschi & Francesco Scervini, 2012. "GINI DP 61: Expansion of Schooling and Educational Inequality in Europe: Educational Kuznets Curve Revisited," GINI Discussion Papers 61, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    • Handle: RePEc:aia:ginidp:61
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    Cited by:

    1. 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.
    2. G.A. Diah Utari, 2014. "Growth and Inequality in Indonesia: Does Kuznets Curve Hold?," EcoMod2014 7353, EcoMod.
    3. 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).
    4. 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.
    5. 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.
    6. 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.
    7. 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.
    8. 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.
    9. 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.
    10. 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.
    11. Elena Meschi & Francesco Scervini, 2014. "A new dataset on educational inequality," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 47(2), pages 695-716, September.
    12. Takahiro Akita, 2025. "Measuring gender disparity in the structure of educational attainment in Asia based on grouped data," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 45(1), pages 1-10.
    13. 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.
    14. Takahiro Akita, 2025. "Measuring gender disparity in the structure of educational attainment in Asia based on grouped data," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 45(1), pages 1-10.
    15. 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.
    16. Takahiro Akita, 2024. "Educational Expansion and Educational Inequality," Working Papers EMS_2024_02, Research Institute, International University of Japan.
    17. Checchi, Daniele & van de Werfhorst, Herman Gerbert, 2017. "Policies, Skills and Earnings: How Educational Inequality Affects Earnings Inequality," SocArXiv wn3h2, Center for Open Science.
    18. 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.
    19. 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.
    20. 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.
    21. 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.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    education; inequality; Kuznets curve; panel data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

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

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