Early school leaving in Scandinavia: Extent and labour market effects

Abstract

The article explores the extent to which the organization of vocational tracks in upper secondary school affects the labour market risks associated with early school exit. The Nordic countries share many features, but the upper secondary school systems differ significantly in how their vocational tracks are organized. Denmark and Norway have dual vocational tracks, that is, they combine school-based education and workplace apprenticeships, whereas in Finland and Sweden they are primarily school based. We analyse administrative longitudinal data from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s in the four countries and find the highest vocational track dropout rates in Norway and the lowest in Finland. The results indicate that the relative labour market effect of dropping out from a vocational track is most detrimental in Norway. It is also in Norway that we find the greatest gender differences in this respect.

Labour market participation among young refugees in Sweden and the potential of education: a national cohort study

“…In this study, we used an indicator of NEET status that is in line with the NEET concept proposed by the Eurofound (Eurofound 2016). This concept has previously been employed in several Swedish studies and has now been adapted to other Nordic countries (Bäckman et al 2015;Bäckman and Nilsson 2016). This NEET categorization is primary based on information on income sources and social benefits according to the level of employment attachment (Bäckman and Nilsson 2016).…”

“…This NEET indicator is primary based on information on income sources and social benefits according to their level of employment attachment. Furthermore, while the NEET indicator employed by the Eurostat in 2016 was measured using data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and used a short reference period of time, the indicator of NEET used in this study and in other Swedish studies (Bäckman and Nilsson 2016;Bäckman et al 2015) covers a longer reference period of time (three consecutive years) in order to capture those who experience long-term disadvantages in terms of education and labour market. The use of a longer reference period is, therefore, an important strength of this study.…”

High School Dropout, Resource Attainment, and Criminal Convictions

“…The national programs contain both vocational and academic tracks. For the cohorts in focus, dropout rates in vocational tracks were about 25 percent and in academic tracks around 13 percent (at a seven year follow-up; Bäckman et al 2015). Approximately half of all dropouts manage to achieve a high school diploma by re-entering school (Bäckman et al 2015).…”

“…In Sweden, as in most other Western countries, educational failure is a strong predictor of precariousness-for example, social exclusion-across the life course (Bäckman and Nilsson 2011;2016). In a recent government report, school failure was pointed out as the single most important predictor for inactivity (i.e., participating in neither employment nor education) among Swedish young adults during the 2000s (SOU 2013: 74; see also Bäckman et al 2015).…”

“…One consequence of this, of course, is that those 1-2 percent who never start high school and dropouts in year 1 of high school are not included in the analyses, and that dropouts after the dropout window are not treated as dropouts. We know that the earlier the dropout, the poorer the prospects for certain events, such as finding a job (Bäckman et al 2015). Since we both exclude a group with poorer prospects from the dropout category and define a group of actual dropouts with better prospects as non-dropouts, the implications of this for the findings are that we probably underestimate the effect of dropout on crime slightly.…”