Tougher Educational Exam Leading to Worse Selection

Eduardo Andrade and Luciano De Castro

No 1533, Discussion Papers from Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science

Abstract: A parallel of education with transformative processes in standard markets suggest that a more severe control of the quality of the output will improve the overall quality of the education. This paper shows a somehow counterintuitive result: an increase in the exam difficulty may reduce the average quality (productivity) of selected individuals. Since the exam does not verify all skills, when its standard rises, candidates with relatively low skills emphasized in the test and high skills demanded in the job may no longer qualify. Hence, an increase in the testing standard may be counterproductive. One implication is that policies should emphasize alignment between the skills tested and those required in the actual jobs, rather than increase exams' difficulties.

Date: 2010-12-01
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/decastro/htm/personal/education.pdf main text (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found (http://kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/decastro/htm/personal/education.pdf [301 Moved Permanently]--> https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/decastro/htm/personal/education.pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nwu:cmsems:1533

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Discussion Papers from Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science, Northwestern University, 580 Jacobs Center, 2001 Sheridan Road, Evanston, IL 60208-2014. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Fran Walker ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).