Educational imbalance, socio-economic inequality, political freedom and economic development

Abstract

This paper describes tests of several hypotheses put forward in the literature on the significance of education as a determinant of economic development. It is shown that the generally positive impact of education on economic development is severely impaired by 'educational imbalance' in the case of tertiary education, whereas economic inequality and repression of political rights primarily seem to reduce the social returns of the lower educational levels.