Public Investment In Higher Education Research Articles

Climbing university rankings under resources constraints: a combined approach integrating DEA and directed Louvain community detection

AbstractOver recent years, scholarly interest in universities’ allocation and effective utilisation of financial resources has been growing. When used efficiently, financial resources may improve universities’ quality of research and teaching, and therefore their positions in world university rankings. However, despite the relevance of financial efficiency to university placement in academic rankings, universities’ total available financial resources appear much more significant. In the present study, we propose an innovative methodology to determine realistic ranking targets for individual universities, based on their available financial resources. In particular, we combine data envelopment analysis, as developed by Banker et al. (Manag Sci 30(9):1078–1092, 1984), and a directed Louvain community detection algorithm to examine 318 universities across five countries, considering their ARWU scores alongside key financial indicators (i.e., long-term physical capital, total operating revenues). We identify clusters of universities with similar financial profiles and corresponding ARWU scores, as well as universities that have optimised their use of financial resources, representing benchmarks for similar universities to emulate. The approach is subsequently applied to Italian universities, as a specific national case. The findings may be useful for policy makers and university managers seeking reliable strategies for climbing academic rankings, particularly in countries with limited public investment in higher education.

College Choice, Private Options, and the Incidence of Public Investment in Higher Education

College Choice, Private Options, and the Incidence of Public Investment in Higher Education

Grads on the go: Measuring college‐specific labor markets for graduates

AbstractThis paper introduces a new measure of the labor markets served by colleges and universities across the United States. About 50% of recent college graduates are living and working in the metro area nearest the institution they attended, with this figure climbing to 67% in‐state. The geographic dispersion of alumni is more than twice as great for highly selective 4‐year institutions as for 2‐year institutions. However, more than one quarter of 2‐year institutions disperse alumni more diversely than the average public 4‐year institution. In one application of these data, we find that the average strength of the labor market to which a college sends its graduates predicts college‐specific intergenerational economic mobility. In a second application, we quantify the extent of “brain drain” across areas and illustrate the importance of considering migration patterns of college graduates when estimating the social return on public investment in higher education.

Skills mismatches in Cambodian higher education: Major causes and possible solutions

Higher education in Cambodia has made noteworthy strides in recent years. However, as the country experiences rapidly evolving economic needs and technological advancements, the mismatch between the skills graduates possess and those demanded by the job market remains a focal point of discussion. This article aims to discuss the issue of skills mismatches in higher education in Cambodia. It provides an understanding of skills mismatches in Cambodian higher education and delves into the major causes of this pressing issue, including limited public investment in higher education, limited involvement of concerned stakeholders, limited use of up-to-date curricula and teaching methods, limited English proficiency, lack of career guidance for students, and a low level of research engagement among Cambodian academics. The article offers solutions to address this pressing issue by emphasizing potential measures, such as providing sufficient orientation to students on the selection of majors in higher education, enhancing government-university-industry linkages, establishing a clear roadmap for improving higher education quality, modernizing curricula and teaching methods, encouraging learner autonomy and a culture of lifelong learning, promoting diversity and inclusion in higher education, enhancing the circulation of information about the job market and industrial needs, and improving the quality and research capacity of faculty members. The article argues that addressing skills mismatches in Cambodian higher education requires a genuine reform and concerted efforts from all concerned stakeholders. It concludes with suggestions for future research.

Student debt and default: The role of for-profit colleges

For-profit providers have become an important fixture of US higher education markets. Students who attend for-profit institutions take on more educational debt and are more likely to default on their student loans than those attending similarly-selective public schools. Because for-profits tend to serve students from more disadvantaged backgrounds, it is important to isolate the causal effect of for-profit enrollment on student debt and repayment outcomes as well as the educational and labor market mechanisms that drive any such effects. We approach this problem using a novel instrument combined with comprehensive institution-level data on student debt, default, educational attainment, and labor market outcomes. Our instrument leverages the interaction between changes in the demand for college due to labor demand shocks and the baseline supply of for-profit schools. We compare how enrollment and subsequent outcomes change across areas that experience similar labor demand shocks but that have different latent supply of for-profit institutions. The first-stage estimates show that students are much more likely to enroll in a for-profit institution for a given labor demand change when there is a higher supply of such schools in the base period. Among four-year students, for-profit enrollment leads to more loans, higher loan amounts, an increased likelihood of borrowing, and an increased risk of default. Two-year for-profit students also take out more loans, originate more student debt, and have higher default rates. We present evidence that these debt and default outcomes are driven by higher for-profit tuition and a negative effect of for-profit enrollment on labor market outcomes. Our results point to high costs and low returns to for-profit enrollment that generate worse student debt and repayment outcomes. These findings have important implications for public investments in higher education as well as for how students make postsecondary choices.

College Choice, Private Options, and the Incidence of Public Investment in Higher Education

Previous measures of the incidence of public investment in higher education focus on the transfer to public college students. This implies that the net benefits to students who do not attend public colleges is negative. However, they miss potential general equilibrium effects on the private college and labor markets. Changes in the public college market affect who private colleges admit, what prices they charge, and the number of students who enroll in any college. We show that capturing these spillovers is important for characterizing incidence using a model of higher education that we validate with quasi-experimental variation in state spending. Unlike previous measures, we find that high-income-modest-ability students especially benefit since they are only admitted to high-quality private colleges when state spending is high, and the public colleges create sufficient competitive pressure. Decreased investment also reduces educational attainment, raising the college wage premium. This exacerbates private college market power.

A comparative analysis of public investments in higher education in Russia and the ones of traditional models of the social State

Subject. This article explores the issues of public investment in higher education around the world. Objectives. The article aims to analyze the mechanisms of public investment in the higher education system in traditional models of the social welfare State and describe the particularities of the financing mechanism for higher education in Russia. Methods. For the study, I used the methods of statistical and comparative analyses, and a graphical statistics interpretation technique. Results. The article reveals the similarities and differences in public investments in higher education in traditional models of the social welfare State and in Russia. It also justifies the need to improve the mechanism used to formula-based finance higher education. Conclusions. Using indicators that reflect targets, together with input-oriented resource indicators, in calculating the amount of public investment provided can help improve the relationship between budget allocations and the performance of Russian educational institutions.

Education and Poverty in Morocco: A Computable General Equilibrium Micro-simulation Analysis

The paper uses a micro-simulation computable general equilibrium model (CGE) to analyze the impact on poverty of public spending in higher education in Morocco. The model incorporates 7062 households derived from the 2007 National Survey on Household Living Standards (ENNVM). Two scenarios are simulated: a 100% reduction in the unit cost of higher education supported by households and a 50% reduction in public spending on higher education. In this study, it is assumed that the investment behavior of households is linked to the share of the unit cost financed by the government in higher education. The results show that the policy of exempting households from bearing any unit cost of higher education encourages them to invest massively in education, which leads to increasing their income and consequently improving welfare and reducing poverty and inequalities. On the other hand, the reduction in public investment in higher education affects negatively the behavior of households to invest in education which leads to a decrease in welfare, an increase in poverty and a rise of inequalities.

Adaptación del Índice de Gini a investigaciones sociológicas sobre la educación

El artículo propone una adaptación del Índice (o Coeficiente) de Gini, habitual para medir la desigualdad en la economía y otras ciencias, a investigaciones sociológicas de la educación. Explica detalladamente el funcionamiento del índice, su mecánica de cálculo, y sus ventajas y expone tres cálculos, con diferentes procedimientos de cálculo, aplicados al ámbito educativo: uno relativo a la inversión pública en educación superior, otro referente a los ajustes de las trayectorias universitarias y el último relacionado con las competencias lingüísticas.

Public Investment Management of Higher Education in Vietnam : Current Issues and Policy Recommendations

Purpose: The aim of the paper is to provide a comprehensive insight on public investment management practices in higher education and experiences of developed countries, to analyse the current approaches to public investment management in Vietnam and to propose applicable policy recommendations. Design/methodology/approach: Case study based on literature of public investment in higher education and analysis of legal documents, reports and data regarding Vietnam’s current practices in the field. Findings: Public investment management practices of Vietnam still follow the traditional approach, which has shown various weaknesses and drawbacks in terms of efficiency, lack of unification, and incapability of higher education institutions to seek for autonomy and alternative operational resources. Research and practical limitations/implications: Lack of quantitative data and survey tools to enhance the practical implementation of the study. Originality/value: This paper can become a reference resource for policy makers in terms of promoting reforms in the public investment system for higher education in the future. Paper type: Case study.

A Neo-Kaleckian model of skill-biased technological change and income distribution*

This article proposes a macrodynamic model that takes into account the joint determination of intra-working-class income distribution and knowledge-intensive technological change. Our model highlights two opposing effects of technological change at play: (i) technological innovation promotes a positive structural change and hence boosts net exports and output growth; (ii) technological change, on the other hand, disproportionately affects unskilled workers, which worsens the intra-working-class income distribution and slows down economic growth. Therefore, our model demonstrates that the net impact of technological change on capital accumulation and output growth is ambiguous and hence is a parametric question. Lastly, we show that income transfer and public investments in higher education may be of paramount importance to alleviating the unwanted effects of a contractionary wave of technological change and so promoting a sustained economic recovery.

Equalization or Selection? Reassessing the “Meritocratic Power” of a College Degree in Intergenerational Income Mobility

Intergenerational mobility is higher among college graduates than among people with lower levels of education. In light of this finding, researchers have characterized a college degree as a great equalizer leveling the playing field, and proposed that expanding higher education would promote mobility. This line of reasoning rests on the implicit assumption that the relatively high mobility observed among college graduates reflects a causal effect of college completion on intergenerational mobility, an assumption that has rarely been rigorously evaluated. This article bridges this gap. Using a novel reweighting technique, I estimate the degree of intergenerational income mobility among college graduates purged of selection processes that may drive up observed mobility in this subpopulation. Analyzing data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979, I find that once selection processes are adjusted for, intergenerational income mobility among college graduates is very close to that among non-graduates. This finding suggests that expanding the pool of college graduates per se is unlikely to boost intergenerational income mobility in the United States. To promote mobility, public investments in higher education (e.g., federal and state student aid programs) should be targeted at low-income youth.

How Does For-Profit College Attendance Affect Student Loans, Defaults and Labor Market Outcomes?

For-profit providers are becoming an increasingly important fixture of US higher education markets. Students who attend for-profit institutions take on more educational debt, have worse labor market outcomes, and are more likely to default than students attending similarly-selective public schools. Because for-profits tend to serve students from more disadvantaged backgrounds, it is important to isolate the causal effect of for-profit enrollment on educational and labor market outcomes. We approach this problem using a novel instrument combined with more comprehensive data on student outcomes than has been employed in prior research. Our instrument leverages the interaction between changes in the demand for college due to labor demand shocks and the local supply of for-profit schools. We compare enrollment and postsecondary outcome changes across areas that experience similar labor demand shocks but that have different latent supply of for-profit institutions. The first-stage estimates show that students are much more likely to enroll in a for-profit institution for a given labor demand change when there is a higher supply of such schools in the base period. Among four-year students, for-profit enrollment leads to more loans, higher loan amounts, an increased likelihood of borrowing, an increased risk of default and worse labor market outcomes. Two-year for-profit students also take out more loans, have higher default rates and lower earnings. But, they are more likely to graduate and to earn over $25,000 per year (the median earnings of high school graduates). Finally, we show that for-profit entry and exit decisions are at most weakly responsive to labor demand shocks. Our results point to low returns to for-profit enrollment that have important implications for public investments in higher education as well as how students make postsecondary choices.

Changing Trends in Financing of Higher Education: A Critical Review

<p align="LEFT"> </p><p><em><span style="font-size: medium;">Education in general and higher education in particular has significant favourable influence on economic development, which calls forth investment in the sector by individuals, households and nation as a whole. However, over the years, many developing countries have showed apathy towards development of higher education. They have reduced public investments in higher education, allowed laissez-faireism, and even adopted policies towards marketisation of higher education. To the extent that the markets in developing countries are ‘incomplete’ and ‘imperfect’, the outcomes are also far from perfect. However, to compete in a global knowledge economy and to traverse along the growth path achieved by the developed countries, the developing countries like India have to accord top priority to higher education. To achieve the 12</span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">th </span><span style="font-size: medium;">Plan targets of 25.2 percent of GER by 2017 and / or to reach the global target of investing 6 percent of GDP in education, India needs to explore the innovative methods of financing of the sector. In this context, this review paper traces the changing trends of financing higher education across the globe over the years and the entry of private sector into the arena. </span></em></p>

Educational Debt in the Context of Career Planning: A Qualitative Exploration of Medical Student Perceptions

ABSTRACTPhenomenon: Medical students in the United States face increasing educational debt because medical education costs have risen while public investment in higher education has declined. Contemporary students borrow more money and accumulate debt far surpassing that of previous generations of physicians, and both interest rates and terms of loan repayment have changed significantly in the last decade. As a result, the experiences of medical students differ from the experiences of physician educators. Little is known about how contemporary medical students view their debt in the context of career planning. Understanding contemporary U.S. medical students’ lived experiences of educational debt is important, because high debt levels may affect medical students’ well-being and professional development. Approach: The study's purpose was to explore contemporary students’ views of their debt in the context of career planning. In 2012, 2nd-year medical students enrolled in a health policy course at one medical school were invited to write an essay about how debt influences their career choices. The authors analyzed 132 essays using immersion and crystallization and iterative, team-based coding. Code-recode strategies, member checking, and reflexivity ensured validity and rigor. Findings: Three themes emerged about the meaning of debt: debt symbolizes lack of social investment, debt reinforces a sense of entitlement, and debt is a collective experience. Four approaches to debt management emerged: anticipation, avoidance, acceptance, and disempowerment. Insights: Medical students’ views of debt are more complex than previously reported. Medical educators should recognize that many students experience debt as a stressor, acknowledge students’ emotions about debt, and invite discussion about the culture of entitlement in medical education and how this culture affects students’ professionalism. At the same time, educators should emphasize that students have many repayment options and that regardless of specialty choice, most physicians repay their debts without significant difficulty. Further exploration is needed of the relationships between the amount of debt owed, students’ attitudes toward their debt, and other student characteristics. Because students experience debt in a range of ways, more nuanced approaches to understanding and reframing student perceptions of debt are necessary.

Equity and the “B” Word: Budgeting and Professional Capacity in Student Affairs

The dual pressures of the national college completion agenda and diminished public investment in higher education have led to a growing reliance on performance-based policies. Using a policy implementation framework, this qualitative study examines the implementation of a performance-based budgeting model at a broad-access urban research university and its implications for student affairs practice. The findings revealed a need for increased capacity within student affairs to better align resources with student success and equity objectives.

Comments by Xiaolan Fu, on Do We Need More Public Investment in Higher Education? Estimating the External Returns to Higher Education in China

Xiaolan Fu: This paper examines external returns to education in China using household survey data from the China Health and Nutrition Survey. It finds positive returns of about 10 to 14 percent, especially for rural, male, and poorly educated workers,whereas returns for urban, female, and highly educated workers were negligible. The paper argues that China should increase public investment in education and target it more at rural areas and poorly educated workers.

Comments by Fung Kwan, on Do We Need More Public Investment in Higher Education? Estimating the External Returns to Higher Education in China

Fung Kwan: With the micro-level data of income and other educational indicators, this paper examines the returns to higher education in China. At the full sample level, fixed-effect estimates show no returns to education. After adjusting the endogeneity problem, the returns become around 10 percent. At the individual level, this study finds the returns to education are small for urban, female, and highly educated workers; but significantly positive for those living in the countryside, male, and low-educated workers.The research issue of this paper is important to developing public policy on investment in education in China. Income and wealth inequalities are likely improved with more education investment in the rural area. Nevertheless, more university graduates have recently found difficulty in finding jobs, giving rise to the concern of educated unemployment in the rapidly developing Chinese economy. This phenomenon is fundamentally correlated to the structural rigidity of China's labor and product markets. More research should be devoted to this issue, as it might have profound policy implications to many developing economies during their structural transformation.Together with the debate on the economy approaching its Lewis turning point and the slowdown of GDP growth, China seems to be moving into its growth with a larger contribution from total factor productivity. Inevitably, investment in higher education is both essential to the accumulation of human capital and productivity growth. China appears to be no exception to accepting the role of higher education in its further economic development.

Do We Need More Public Investment in Higher Education? Estimating the External Returns to Higher Education in China

Despite its significance in policymaking and theory, empirical work on external returns to education has not been fruitful, and most studies focus on developed countries. This paper discusses external returns to education in China, an important developing economy. Using longitudinal data from the China Health and Nutrition Survey, we estimate a fixed-effects instrumental variables model and find positive returns of about 10 to 14 percent. Negligible returns are found for urban, female, and highly educated workers, and returns are positive and statistically significant for rural, male, and poorly educated workers. This suggests that China should increase public investment in education and target rural areas and poorly educated workers. Gender differences in the external returns to education may also imply that China should make more efforts to enhance the capacity of “networking” and competitiveness for women.

Comments by Kiichio Fukasaku, on Do We Need More Public Investment in Higher Education? Estimating the External Returns to Higher Education in China

obtain sizeable positive external returns to education for the whole population. They argue that their instrument “is expected to be valid based on the assumption that the provincial number of ‘211’ universities impacts on individual wages only through its effect on the share of college graduates in that province while all else is equal. Because a province with more ‘211’ universities is always a more attractive place to study and work, it is quite natural that more college graduates would enter the labor market there.” In fact, the other way around might also be true: Namely, a place with a higher level of development (and wage rate) may have better financial and human resources and hence more “211” universities.