Investment in Human Capital Through Post-Compulsory Education and Training: Selected Efficiency and Equity Aspects

Sveinbjörn Blöndal, Simon Field () and Nathalie Girouard ()

No 333, OECD Economics Department Working Papers from OECD Publishing

Abstract: This paper examines various efficiency and equity aspects related to the skill acquisition of young people and older adults. The analysis suggests that such human capital investment is associated with significant labour-market gains for individuals, including higher post-tax earnings and better employment prospects, which exceed the investment costs, mainly foregone earnings and tuition fees, by a significant margin. It also shows that the net benefits are strongly influenced by policy-related factors, such as study length, tuition subsidies and student support. Overall, the estimates reported in the paper indicate that there are strong incentives for the average student to continue studying beyond the compulsory schooling age, and also point to the benefits of such investment in education for society as a whole. However, the net gains fall with age, mainly reflecting a shorter period to take advantage of the benefits that come with education. Finally the paper notes that students ...

Investissement en capital humain au travers de l'éducation et la formation post-obligatoires Le présent document porte sur divers aspects de l'équité et de l'efficience qui sont liés à l'acquisition de qualifications par les jeunes et les adultes relativement âgés. L'analyse donne à penser que ce type d'investissement dans le capital humain procure aux personnes d'importants avantages sur le marché du travail, notamment des gains, après impôt, plus élevés et de meilleures perspectives d'emploi, avantages qui compensent largement le coût des investissements, c'est à dire, principalement, le manque à gagner et les frais d'études. Il ressort également de cette analyse que les avantages nets varient considérablement sous l'effet de facteurs liés à l'action des pouvoirs publics, tels que la durée de la scolarisation, les allocations d'études, et le soutien apporté aux élèves. Globalement, les estimations indiquées dans le rapport montrent que l'élève moyen serait fortement incité à poursuivre ses études audelà de l'âge de l'obligation scolaire et elles mettent également en ...

Keywords: capital humain; chômage; earnings; gains; human capital; impôt; soutien aux élèves; student support; taxes; unemployment; équité (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 I21 I22 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2002-07-11
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (35)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1787/778845424272 (text/html)

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:oec:ecoaaa:333-en

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in OECD Economics Department Working Papers from OECD Publishing Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().