The NZ labour market is among the most flexible in the OECD, and outcomes for its young people have been among the best. However, labour-market opportunities are heavily determined by initial education, where New Zealand’s system is also successful and innovative in many ways. Average PISA...

I take advantage of a sharp discontinuity in the probability of admission to an elite university at the admission score threshold, to estimate causal returns to college education quality. I use a newly constructed dataset, which combines individual administrative records about high school,...

I take advantage of a sharp discontinuity in the probability of admission to an elite university at the admission score threshold, to estimate causal returns to college education quality. I use a newly constructed dataset, which combines individual administrative records about high school,...

This paper assesses how policies and institutions affect private returns to invest in tertiary human capital, the ability of individuals to finance this investment and the institutional characteristics of tertiary education systems. Focusing on core tertiary education services, the paper...

We study the labor market returns to a State guaranteed loan used to finance university degrees in Chile. Using a regression discontinuity design, we show that marginally eligible students forego vocational education in favor of universities but reduce their probability of graduation. Despite...

How does financial aid design affect student behavior and achievement? We first estimate the impact of a study-aid reform that caused students to work more and accumulate less debt. To quantify mechanisms and perform counterfactuals, we estimate a dynamic model of college enrollment, work, and...

This study provides estimates of the private Internal Rates of Return (IRR) to tertiary education for women and men in 21 OECD countries, for the years between 1991 and 2005. IRR are computed by estimating labour market premia on cross-country comparable individual-level data. Labour market...

This paper assesses how policies and institutions affect private returns to invest in tertiary human capital, the ability of individuals to finance this investment and the institutional characteristics of tertiary education systems. Focusing on core tertiary education services, the paper...

The lack of human capital in Portugal has become a key obstacle to higher growth. This paper discusses the performance of education and training services in Portugal and shows that improvements are needed to narrow the significant human capital gap with other OECD countries. Despite progress in...

The Australian education system fares well in international comparison with regards to PISA test scores and the higher education system attracts an increasing number of foreign students. Vocational education and training (VET) is an important part of the post–secondary education system,...