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Quality of higher education and the labor market in developing countries: Evidence from an education reform in Senegal

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  • Dorothée Boccanfuso

    (Department of economics and GRÉDI, UniversitÉ de Sherbrooke)

  • Alexandre Larouche

    (Del Degan, Massé)

  • Mircea Trandafir

    (Département d'économique and GRÉDI, Université de Sherbrooke)

Abstract

While many studies look into the effect of primary school quality on labor market outcomes in developing countries, little is known about the effects at higher education levels. In this paper, we use the experiment provided by a large-scale education reform launched in Senegal in 2000 to examine the effects of quality improvements at the university level on the labor market outcomes of young high-skilled workers. Our estimates from a difference-in-difference model suggest that young university-educated workers have an employment rate about 12 percentage points higher after the reform as compared to older workers. In addition, we find that they are more likely to find employment in the service industry and in public or private enterprises. These estimates, which are robust to a host of robustness checks, support the idea that improvements in the quality of education reduce the mismatch between the quality of labor demanded and supplied in the high-skilled market.

Suggested Citation

  • Dorothée Boccanfuso & Alexandre Larouche & Mircea Trandafir, 2011. "Quality of higher education and the labor market in developing countries: Evidence from an education reform in Senegal," Cahiers de recherche 11-17, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke, revised May 2012.
    • Handle: RePEc:shr:wpaper:11-17
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    7. Bacalhau, Priscilla & Mattos, Enlinson & Ponczek, Vladimir Pinheiro, 2019. "College quality signaling and individual performance: effects on labor market outcomes after graduation," Textos para discussão 502, FGV EESP - Escola de Economia de São Paulo, Fundação Getulio Vargas (Brazil).
    8. Lucía Mateos-Romero & María del Mar Salinas-Jiménez, 2018. "Labor Mismatches: Effects on Wages and on Job Satisfaction in 17 OECD Countries," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 140(1), pages 369-391, November.
    9. Lidia Alexa & Veronica Maier & Anca Șerban & Razvan Craciunescu, 2020. "Engineers Changing the World: Education for Sustainability in Romanian Technical Universities—An Empirical Web-Based Content Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-20, March.
    10. Asmus Zoch, 2017. "The effect of neighbourhoods and school quality on education and labour market outcomes in South Africa," Working Papers 08/2017, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
    11. Chiara Mussida & Dario Sciulli & Marcello Signorelli, 2016. "Early School Leaving and Work Outcomes in Developing Countries," Quaderni del Dipartimento di Economia, Finanza e Statistica 26/2016, Università di Perugia, Dipartimento Economia.
    12. Hazal Colak Oz & Çiçek Güven & Gonzalo Nápoles, 2023. "School dropout prediction and feature importance exploration in Malawi using household panel data: machine learning approach," Journal of Computational Social Science, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 245-287, April.
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    14. Jarrín-V, Pablo & Falconí, Fander & Cango, Pedro & Ramos-Martin, Jesus, 2021. "Knowledge gaps in Latin America and the Caribbean and economic development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
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    16. Gabriel Bratucu & Alexandra Palade (Zamfirache) & Anca Madar & Nicoleta Andreea Neacsu, 2017. "Competition on the University Educational Services Market in Romania and the Protection of Students’ Rights and Interests," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 19(45), pages 414-414, May.
    17. Dursun, Bahadır & Cesur, Resul & Mocan, Naci, 2018. "The Impact of Education on Health Outcomes and Behaviors in a Middle-Income, Low-Education Country," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 94-114.
    18. Chen, Shuang, 2018. "Education and transition to work: Evidence from Vietnam, Cambodia and Nepal," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 92-105.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Higher education; employment; impact analysis; quality mismatch;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • O55 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Africa

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