Die Discussion Papers dienen einer möglichst schnellen Verbreitung von neueren Forschungsarbeiten des ZEW. Die Beiträge liegen in alleiniger Verantwortung der Autoren und stellen nicht notwendigerweise die Meinung des ZEW dar.Discussion Papers are intended to make results of ZEW research promptly available to other economists in order to encourage discussion and suggestions for revisions. The authors are solely responsible for the contents which do not necessarily represent the opinion of the ZEW.Download this ZEW Discussion Paper from our ftp server:ftp://ftp.zew.de/pub/zew-docs/dp/dp0206.pdf
Non technical summaryThis article develops a model of educational attainment which is imbedded in the human capital theory, the reference theory for the economic analysis of issues related to education. The principle of this model is that there is a finite number of possible educational alternatives which may be ordered by level. Each educational alternative yields a certain utility to the individual. The net utility of an educational alternative is expressed in terms of the difference between the "returns" and the "costs" associated with this alternative for any individual with specific characteristics and constraints. The individual chooses, given his specific constraints or characteristics, to attain the education level which maximises his net utility.In its simplest version, the formalisation of these assumptions leads to an ordered probit model where the threshold values are given by the expected ratio of the marginal costs to the marginal returns. In other words, the individual assesses the marginal costs and the marginal returns associated with the next higher education level, and if the ratio of the former to the latter, given his characteristics, is below a certain threshold, he will opt for the next higher level. In a second step, the educational process is decomposed into two stages: achievement at school and post-school achievement. The same conceptual framework applies at both stages, but a correlation is permitted between them. Empirically, this boils down to estimate a multivariate ordered probit model, where we have one equation for secondary education and as many post-secondary education equations as there are secondary school degrees. The model makes it possible to investigate whether some factors exert a different influence depending on the stage in the educational process, and whether timevariant factors also play a role.An illustration based on German data shows how this model functions in practice. The explanatory variables used are the traditional ones encountered in the literature on educational attainment: cohort dummies and variables depicting family background. Differences across genders in the parameters have been systematically tested. The example of an application of the basic version of the model shows that it is very easily estimable empirically, while providing an economic interpretation framework which makes sense in economic terms. The application of the decomposition of the educational c...