 A comparison of A-level performance in economics and business studies: How much more difficult is economics?Education Economics, 2005, vol. 13, issue 1, 85-108 Abstract: This paper uses A-Level Information System data to compare academic performance in two subjects often viewed as relatively close substitutes for one another at A-level. The important role of GCSE achievement is confirmed for both subjects. There is evidence of strong gender effects and variation in outcomes across Examination Boards. A counterfactual exercise suggests that if the sample of Business Studies candidates had studied Economics nearly 40% of those who obtained a grade C or better in the former subject would not have done so in the latter. The opposite exercise suggests that 12% more Economics candidates would have achieved a grade C or better if they had taken Business Studies. In order to render a Business Studies A-level grade comparable with an Economics one in terms of relative difficulty, we estimate that a downward adjustment of 1.5 UCAS points should be applied to the former subject. This adjustment is lower than that suggested by correction factors based on conventional subject pair analysis for these two subjects Keywords: Business Studies; Economics; subject difficulty; ordered probit (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:edecon:v:13:y:2005:i:1:p:85-108 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from DOI: 10.1080/0964529042000325225 Access Statistics for this article Education Economics is currently edited by Caren Wareing and Steve Bradley More articles in Education Economics from Taylor & Francis Journals |
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