As Higher Education Expands, is it Contributing to Greater Inequality?

Abstract

This paper reviews the various elements that enter into the relation between higher education expansion and income distribution. Contrary to the prevailing ideology, the paper suggests that under certain conditions the mass expansion of higher education can contribute to greater income inequality. These conditions are related to three important variables not usually considered in the education-income distribution model: rising returns to university education relative to secondary and primary education, decreasing public spending differences between higher and lower levels of education, and increasing spending differences between elite and mass universities. All three appear to be increasingly common features of educational expansion in developing countries, including large ones such as China, Russia, Brazil, and India, although researchers are just beginning to observe such changing patterns of spending within higher education systems. The paper discusses the role that such payoffs and government education spending patterns can play in contributing to changes in income distribution using suggestive data from the developing countries.

The Role of Age and Gender in Educational Expansion: The South Asian Experience in the Global Context

“…Quality differentials in developing countries result, for example, from higher pupil–teacher ratios in urban as compared to remote rural areas, which are expensive to serve and tend to be inhabited by minorities (Bing, ). Carnoy () discusses discrepancies between private universities, which absorb the bulk of the increasing student numbers, and a small segment of well‐funded public universities in Latin America and East Asia. Post‐school learning might take place at work or in specialized educational institutions (see, e.g., Schuetze, ; Cohn and Addison, ), with differing implications for quality and access.…”

Expansion of higher education and inequality of opportunities: a cross-national analysis

“…Although the expansion of higher education has been considered generally as a democratizing process that will contribute to greater equality, these claims are now contested, because some argue that differentiated mass higher education may even contribute to greater inequality (Carnoy, 2011). The greater heterogeneity in quality across institutions is already reflected in the increasing differentiation in the value of degrees from different institutions and different subjects in the labor market (Green & Zhu, 2010;Reimer et al, 2008).…”

Retorno de la Educación Superior en Chile: Efecto en la movilidad social a través del estimador de Diferencias en Diferencias

“…La abundante investigación sobre tasas de retorno de la inversión en educación, ha tenido una influencia crucial en dichas recomendaciones de política (Psacharopoulos y Patrinos 2004). La investigación en el área, ha retomado fuerza, en la medida que la educación ha pasado a ocupar un lugar estratégico de la política pública, en la mayoría de los países y, especialmente, debido a la potencial vinculación entre educación y desarrollo económico (Carnoy, 2011).…”

“…Para la mayoría de los países, se aprecia una correlación positiva entre inversión en capital humano y salarios laborales (Carnoy, 2011). Asimismo, las diferencias a nivel individual en los recursos de capital humano, siguen siendo fuente primaria de las desigualdades sociales, en las sociedades modernas (Tieben, Hofäcker, y Biedinger, 2013).…”