Non-cognitive skills are important predictors of success on the labour market and in many areas of economic and social life. This paper explores the current literature on the economics of non-cognitive skill formation and the most important explanatory factors behind the recent boost of the...

Improving education and skills is the linchpin to reduce income inequality and boost productivity growth. This paper argues that to improve, and make better use of, the skills of the labour force, Chile could gain a lot from a comprehensive and consistent Skills Strategy along three pillars:...

Institutions of the liberal democracies of the developed Western world are increasingly insufficient to deal with the ever worsening of social problems associated with technological progress, the rapid economic transformation of the economy, the demographic issues and the acceleration of...

Children growing up in disadvantaged neighborhoods tend to perform significantly worse in school compared to children growing up under more favorable circumstances. We examine the impact of a three-year program ("Coaching for Teaching") targeted at ten poorly performing lower secondary schools...

From 2010 onwards, most US states have aligned their education standards by adopting the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for math and English Language Arts. The CCSS did not target other subjects such as science and social studies. We estimate spillovers of the CCSS on student achievement in...

Using matching estimator techniques developed by Heckman, Ichimura, Smith and Todd (1998) and Heckman, Lalonde and Smith (1999), we explore the determinants of achievement rates in standardized tests of Colombian students attending public and private schools. This methodology allows us to...

Randomized field experiments designed to better understand the production of human capital have increased exponentially over the past several decades. This chapter summarizes what we have learned about various partial derivatives of the human capital production function, what important partial...