IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/col/000089/015352.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Expansion of Higher Education in Colombia: Bad Students or Bad Programs?

Author

Listed:
  • Adriana Camacho
  • Julián Messina
  • Juan Pablo Uribe

Abstract

A rapid expansion in the demand for post-secondary education triggered an unprecedented boom of higher education programs in Colombia, possibly deteriorating quality. This paper uses rich administrative data matching school admission information, socio-economic characteristics of the young graduates, standardized test scores pre- and post-tertiary education and entry wages, to assess the heterogeneity in the value added generated by new higher education programs. Our findings show that once we account for self-selection the penalty of attending a recently created program, which initially appeared to be quite large, becomes close to zero.

Suggested Citation

  • Adriana Camacho & Julián Messina & Juan Pablo Uribe, 2017. "The Expansion of Higher Education in Colombia: Bad Students or Bad Programs?," Documentos CEDE 15352, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    • Handle: RePEc:col:000089:015352
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://repositorio.uniandes.edu.co/bitstream/handle/1992/8692/dcede2017-13.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Justine S. Hastings & Christopher A. Neilson & Seth D. Zimmerman, 2013. "Are Some Degrees Worth More than Others? Evidence from college admission cutoffs in Chile," NBER Working Papers 19241, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Baez, Javier E. & Camacho, Adriana, 2011. "Assessing the Long-term Effects of Conditional Cash Transfers on Human Capital: Evidence from Colombia," IZA Discussion Papers 5751, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Bassi, Marina & Busso, Matías & Muñoz, Juan Sebastián, 2013. "Is the Glass Half Empty or Half Full?: School Enrollment, Graduation, and Dropout Rates in Latin America," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 4671, Inter-American Development Bank.
    4. Jorge Rodríguez & Sergio Urzúa & Loreto Reyes, 2016. "Heterogeneous Economic Returns to Post-Secondary Degrees: Evidence from Chile," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 51(2), pages 416-460.
    5. Carolina González-Velosa & Graciana Rucci & Miguel Sarzosa & Sergio Urzúa, 2015. "Returns to Higher Education in Chile and Colombia," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 88676, Inter-American Development Bank.
    6. Gasparini, Leonardo & Galiani, Sebastian & Cruces, Guillermo & Acosta, Pablo A., 2011. "Educational Upgrading and Returns to Skills in Latin America: Evidence from a Supply-Demand Framework, 1990-2010," IZA Discussion Papers 6244, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. W. Bentley MacLeod & Evan Riehl & Juan E. Saavedra & Miguel Urquiola, 2017. "The Big Sort: College Reputation and Labor Market Outcomes," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 223-261, July.
    8. Pedro Carneiro & Sokbae Lee, 2011. "Trends in Quality-Adjusted Skill Premia in the United States, 1960-2000," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2309-2349, October.
    9. Paul Oyer, 2006. "Initial Labor Market Conditions and Long-Term Outcomes for Economists," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 20(3), pages 143-160, Summer.
    10. Cunha, Jesse M. & Miller, Trey, 2014. "Measuring value-added in higher education: Possibilities and limitations in the use of administrative data," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 64-77.
    11. González-Velosa, Carolina & Rucci, Graciana & Sarzosa, Miguel & Urzúa, Sergio, 2015. "Returns to Higher Education in Chile and Colombia," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 6858, Inter-American Development Bank.
    12. Loreto Reyes & Jorge Rodríguez & Sergio S. Urzúa, 2013. "Heterogeneous Economic Returns to Postsecondary Degrees: Evidence from Chile," NBER Working Papers 18817, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Chinhui Juhn & Dae Il Kim & Francis Vella, 2005. "The Expansion of College Education in the United States: Is There Evidence of Declining Cohort Quality?," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 43(2), pages 303-315, April.
    14. Sergio Firpo & Nicole M. Fortin & Thomas Lemieux, 2009. "Unconditional Quantile Regressions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(3), pages 953-973, May.
    15. Robert Moffitt, 2008. "Estimating Marginal Treatment Effects in Heterogeneous Populations," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 91-92, pages 239-261.
    16. Marina Bassi & Matias Busso & Juan Sebastian Muñoz, 2015. "Enrollment, Graduation, and Dropout Rates in Latin America: Is the Glass Half Empty or Half Full?," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2015), pages 113-156, October.
    17. Liuba Kogan, 2013. "Metodologías en torno a los estudios del cuerpo: el drama de la Cenicienta," Working Papers 13-02, Centro de Investigación, Universidad del Pacífico.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Laajaj, Rachid & Moya, Andrés & Sánchez, Fabio, 2022. "Equality of opportunity and human capital accumulation: Motivational effect of a nationwide scholarship in Colombia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    2. Ricardo Nogales & Pamela Córdova & Manuel Urquidi, 2020. "The impact of university reputation on employment opportunities: Experimental evidence from Bolivia," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 31(4), pages 524-542, December.
    3. Juliana Londoño-Vélez, 2022. "The Impact of Diversity on Perceptions of Income Distribution and Preferences for Redistribution," NBER Working Papers 30386, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Adolfo Meisel Roca & Angela Granger Serrano, 2022. "El éxito de los pilos: un estudio de caso," Revista de Economía del Rosario, Universidad del Rosario, vol. 25(1), June.
    5. Ferreyra,Maria Marta & Galindo,Camila & Urzúa,Sergio, 2021. "Labor Market Effects of Short-Cycle Higher Education Programs : Lessons from Colombia," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9717, The World Bank.
    6. Yoshimichi Murakami & Tomokazu Nomura, 2023. "Decline in values of degrees and recent evolution of wage inequality: Evidence from Chile," Estudios de Economia, University of Chile, Department of Economics, vol. 50(1 Year 20), pages 55-132, June.
    7. Londoño-Vélez, Juliana, 2022. "The impact of diversity on perceptions of income distribution and preferences for redistribution," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    8. Luis E. Arango & Luz A. Flórez & María A. Olarte-Delgado, 2019. "Precio del carbón y dinámica laboral en Valledupar," Revista de Economía del Rosario, Universidad del Rosario, vol. 22(2), pages 313-370, December.
    9. Leonardo Fabio Morales & Christian Posso & Luz A. Flórez, 2021. "Heterogeneity in the Returns to Tertiary Education for the Disadvantage Youth: Quality vs. Quantity Analysis," Borradores de Economia 1150, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    10. Juliana Londono-Velez & Catherine Rodriguez & Fabio Sánchez?, 2017. "The Intended and Unintended Impacts of a Merit-Based Financial Aid Program for the Poor: The Case of Ser Pilo Paga," Documentos CEDE 15466, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    11. Julian Messina & Joana Silva, 2018. "Wage Inequality in Latin America," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 28682, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leonardo Fabio Morales & Christian Posso & Luz A. Flórez, 2021. "Heterogeneity in the Returns to Tertiary Education for the Disadvantage Youth: Quality vs. Quantity Analysis," Borradores de Economia 1150, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    2. Ana Maria Montoya & Carlos Noton & Alex Solis, 2017. "Returns to Higher Education: Vocational Education vs College," Documentos de Trabajo 334, Centro de Economía Aplicada, Universidad de Chile.
    3. Nora Lustig & Luis F. Lopez-Calva & Eduardo Ortiz-Juarez & Célestin Monga, 2016. "Deconstructing the Decline in Inequality in Latin America," International Economic Association Series, in: Kaushik Basu & Joseph E. Stiglitz (ed.), Inequality and Growth: Patterns and Policy, chapter 7, pages 212-247, Palgrave Macmillan.
    4. Sergio Urzua, 2019. "Redistribution Through Education: The Value of Public Education Spending," Commitment to Equity (CEQ) Working Paper Series 88, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    5. García Ramos, Yboon & Flores-Bazán, Fabian & Nicolas Hadjisavvas, 2017. "About the sum of quasiconvex functions," Working Papers 17-07, Centro de Investigación, Universidad del Pacífico.
    6. Carneiro, Pedro & Lee, Sokbae, 2009. "Estimating distributions of potential outcomes using local instrumental variables with an application to changes in college enrollment and wage inequality," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 149(2), pages 191-208, April.
    7. W. Bentley MacLeod & Evan Riehl & Juan E. Saavedra & Miguel Urquiola, 2017. "The Big Sort: College Reputation and Labor Market Outcomes," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 223-261, July.
    8. Castro-Zarzur, Rosa & Espinoza, Ricardo & Sarzosa, Miguel, 2022. "Unintended consequences of free college: Self-selection into the teaching profession," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    9. Verónica Alaimo & Mariano Bosch & David S. Kaplan & Carmen Pagés & Laura Ripani, 2015. "Jobs for Growth," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 90977, February.
    10. Lisa Simon, 2019. "Mikroökonometrische Analysen der Determinanten von Individuellem Arbeitsmarkterfolg," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 83, March.
    11. Meier, Volker & Schiopu, Ioana, 2020. "Enrollment expansion and quality differentiation across higher education systems," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 43-53.
    12. Gregory Kurtzon, 2012. "Ability Composition Effects on the Education Premium," Working Papers 456, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
    13. Verdugo, Gregory, 2014. "The great compression of the French wage structure, 1969–2008," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 131-144.
    14. Pedro Carneiro & Sokbae Lee, 2011. "Trends in Quality-Adjusted Skill Premia in the United States, 1960-2000," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(6), pages 2309-2349, October.
    15. Pablo Lavado & Nelson Oviedo & Gustavo Yamada, 2017. "La evidencia de rendimientos de la educación superior a partir de Ponte en Carrera," Working Papers 1608, Departamento de Economía, Universidad del Pacífico, revised Feb 2017.
    16. Mendolicchio Concetta & Paolini Dimitri & Pietra Tito, 2012. "Asymmetric Information And Overeducation," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-29, October.
    17. Joseph G. Altonji & Ling Zhong, 2021. "The Labor Market Returns to Advanced Degrees," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 39(2), pages 303-360.
    18. Kirkebøen, Lars & Leuven, Edwin & Mogstad, Magne, 2014. "Field of Study, Earnings, and Self-Selection," Memorandum 29/2014, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    19. Gordon Dahl & Dan-Olof Rooth & Anders Stenberg, 2020. "High School Majors, Comparative (Dis)Advantage, and Future Earnings," NBER Working Papers 27524, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Joanna Alvarado-Uribe & Paola Mejía-Almada & Ana Luisa Masetto Herrera & Roland Molontay & Isabel Hilliger & Vinayak Hegde & José Enrique Montemayor Gallegos & Renato Armando Ramírez Díaz & Hector G. , 2022. "Student Dataset from Tecnologico de Monterrey in Mexico to Predict Dropout in Higher Education," Data, MDPI, vol. 7(9), pages 1-17, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Returns to Tertiary Education; Heterogeneity; Value Added of Higher Education; Colombia;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:col:000089:015352. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ceandco.html .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Universidad De Los Andes-Cede (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ceandco.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.