“For One More Year with You”: Changes in Compulsory Schooling, Education and the Distribution of Wages in Europe

Giorgio Brunello, Margherita Fort and Guglielmo Weber

No 3102, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Using data from 12 European countries and the variation across countries and over time in the changes of minimum school leaving age, we study the effects of the quantity of education on the distribution of earnings. We find that compulsory school reforms significantly affect educational attainment, especially among individuals belonging to the lowest quantiles of the distribution of ability. There is also evidence that additional education reduces conditional wage inequality, and that education and ability are substitutes in the earnings function. These results do not support an elitist public education policy - more education to the brightest - and suggest that investing in the less fortunate, either because of poor labour market fortune or because of poor talent, could pay off both on efficiency and on equity grounds.

Keywords: returns to education; quantile treatment effects; education reforms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 56 pages
Date: 2007-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-eec, nep-hrm, nep-lab and nep-ltv
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published - published as 'Changes in Compulsory Schooling, Education and the Distribution of Wages in Europe' in: Economic Journal, 2009, 119 (536), 516 - 539

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