Using Project Talent and census data, estimates are made with a recursive model to explain scores on standardized tests, school continuation behavior, and lifetime income. Exogenous variables include socioeconomic backgrounds of students and their classmates, school spending, race, and region. The results suggest that: (1) school spending has its…

Uses data from Japanese households to calculate the income elasticities of educational expenditure, allowing elasticities to vary nonmonotonically with household income. Explores whether income elasticities for education peak in the middle-income categories and diminish for the lower and upper ends of income distribution. Income elasticities do…

Imagine a different kind of financial aid for those who can not afford the skyrocketing prices of today's college education. It involves selling shares of oneself--selling shares that would provide a return on one's potential earnings to those willing to invest in one's education. In this article, the author comments on Gary Wolfram's selling…

The last five years have seen a significant increase in the involvement of the private sector in the core areas of education delivery and not just in the provision of educational support services. This growing involvement of the private sector in education has been commented on in the press and in debates on education, but it is often…

"Childhood Programs and Practices in the First Decade of Life" presents research findings on the effects of early childhood programs and practices in the first decade of life and their implications for policy development and reform. Leading scholars in the multidisciplinary field of human development and in early childhood learning…

The economic benefits and investment functions of education and its relationship to other human resource investments are reported. In addition, a report on the revenue yields of various taxes related to economic conditions is included. The concept of human investment is discussed from the standpoint of its similarities with physical capital…

Since the education boom of the sixties enough time has passed for estimates to be made of the profitability of such a highly speculative investment of human capital. Only from these sources of information can we determine future education and manpower, and develop human resources. Returns to education are clearly visible, whether they differ…

Until the 1950s, Canadian economists demonstrated little concern about the relationship between education and society's economic performance. In the 1960s, the neoclassical school became preoccupied with education's investment potential and, with the Keynsians, formed a consensus on greatly increased expenditures. In the 1970s, this judgment was…

Reviews research evidence on the benefits and costs of increasing investment in children, and a redirection of some economic policies that have an indirect impact on children. Concludes that much more could be done to enhance the well-being of children, but it would require a willingness to increase both public spending and taxation. (MOK)

The 1980s and 1990s have been decades of quite good economic growth in North America and much of Western Europe. But how have the fruits of growth been shared? This paper reviews changing income distributions in the U.S., Germany and the Netherlands. These three countries may be taken as exemplars and leading economic performers in "the three…

In this paper, the author looks at the contribution of education to economic growth and examines the desirability of public vs private financing of education from the standpoint of economic efficiency and equity. The author sees expenditures on education as an investment in human capital, the contribution to output of such an investment depending…

Students' poor international standing, declining test scores, teacher shortages, and inadequate salaries are factors directly related to economic survival of the United States by threatening to create a nation of technological illiterates. Government must encourage total school effectiveness. (PB)

Many leaders of public research universities worry about falling behind private research universities at a time when private university finances have improved dramatically and state support for higher education has declined. In this paper, I provide grounds for a more optimistic view of the competitive position of public research universities. I…

Reviews development of the investment concept in education, analyzes some of its strengths and weaknesses, and cites recent data on the desirability of further educational investment. Identifies educational benefits that are not commonly recognized and are not usually included in economic analyses of the value of education. (Author/JG)

The American higher education establishment has combined an economic theory of human nature with a unique system for financing itself. Salaries, new classrooms, libraries, etc., are paid for with tax money; buildings, equipment, maintenance, and management of dormitories, dining halls, etc., are paid by student fees. (MLW)