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> Large parts of Africa and almost all of Latin America are more highly educated now than 1970s Europe Source please? I have been working in Brazil for the pas

> Large parts of Africa and almost all of Latin America are more highly educated now than 1970s Europe Source please? I have been working in Brazil for the past few years and the education level here is nowhere near 1970s Europe. Not even close. The public primary school system is so bad that any family who can afford it - even poor people - pay for private school. Sometimes only a $100 a month for the cheapest private schools. They are not very good, but they are better than the public schools and so there are an estimated 40,000 private schools in Brazil. About 40% of the primary and secondary schools. So about 60% of Brazilians get a very substandard primary and secondary school education. At least 26% of the population earns below $56 USD a month and as a result the government gives them $13 a month but only if their children are vaccinated and stay in school. That should give you an idea of the level of poverty and the tax base upon which the public schools in those areas have to operate on. Conversely, the free government run universities are excellent and hard to get into. Ironically, the vast majority of students accepted are from elite and expensive private primary and secondary schools. So the free public universities are mostly a service for wealthy or at least upper middle class kids. Your claim that almost all of Latin America is more highly educated now than 1970s Europe is highly suspect unless you can provide something to back that up.

barry-cotter 6y ago
Algeria, Tunisia, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Mexico, Argentina and Indonesia all have a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in-tertiary-education?country=FRA~DZA~ARG~BRA~CHL~TUN~ETH~IDN~VEN~BOL~MEX https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in...
- tchaffee 6y ago
  I can see now where you are getting your idea but that's a quantitative measure only which does not consider quality of education. The reason that 1970s Europe was better educated than Brazil or Latin America today is because of the substandard education so many will get from public secondary school and that's where their education stops. Enrollment ratio in university also doesn't say much about graduation rates. What surprised me after living in Europe and that you will not find nearly as often in Latin America, is just how well educated someone is who only attended secondary school. Your claim also included a question about why these countries are still poor. Brazil is not competing with the France of the 1970s.
  - barry-cotter 6y ago
    > Your claim also included a question about why these countries are still poor. Brazil is not competing with the France of the 1970s. I made no such claim. I said that education was a consequence of economic growth, not vice versa. That is all. If you do a regression of changes in education over time versus changes in economic growth there is no trend. Changes in education do not cause changes in economic growth. That Brazil is not competing with 1970s France is irrelevant to my claim. Education is a consequence rather than a cause of growth.
    - tchaffee 6y ago
      Then I'm very confused by what you originally wrote: > Large parts of Africa and almost all of Latin America are more highly educated now than 1970s Europe and poorer than it. Brazil's economic growth has been between 5% and 10% since the 1970s. That's pretty respectable. So how can you claim which is the causation? > I said that education was a consequence of economic growth, not vice versa. > The most obvious example of economic growth not being associated with education is post Deng Xiaoping China. The huge majority had primary school education at best and the economy just kept growing and growing. From your own source, China also has a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. In fact, the chart for China looks very similar to Brazil. And with both countries "the economy just kept growing and growing." > If you do a regression of changes in education over time versus changes in economic growth there is no trend. Source? Where can we find that analysis? > That Brazil is not competing with 1970s France is irrelevant to my claim. Education is a consequence rather than a cause of growth. You don't have to look at relative education levels to understand if a competitive advantage in education leads to growth? It would be naive to claim any change in education will result in economic growth. So hopefully what we are talking about here is changes in education that lead to one country being ahead in education in some qualitative measures. At which point you would be able to understand whether or not being ahead of another country in education results in growth.
      - barry-cotter 6y ago
        > From your own source, China also has a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. In fact, the chart for China looks very similar to Brazil. Yes, China got rich so it started spending money on education. That’s my point. An educated populace is a consequence of a rich one, not a cause. > Does Schooling Cause Growth or the Other Way Around? > Barro (1991) and others find that growth and schooling are highly correlated across countries, with each additional year of 1960 enrollment associated with about .6% per year faster growth in per capita GDP from 1960 to 1990. In a model with finite-lived individuals who choose schooling, schooling can influence growth, but also faster technology-driven growth can induce more schooling by raising the effective rate of return on investment in schooling. We consider a variety of evidence to determine the strength of these channels, with two main findings. First, faster-growing countries have at most modestly flatter cross-sectional experience-earnings profiles, consistent with a minority role for the channel from schooling to growth. Second, we calibrate the model using evidence from the labor literature and employ UNESCO attainment data to construct schooling going back well before 1960. > We find the channel from schooling to growth to be too weak to generate even half of Barro's coefficient under a range of plausible parameter values. The reverse channel from expected growth to schooling, in contrast, is capable of explaining the empirical relationship. We conclude that the evidence favors a dominant role for the reverse channel from growth to schooling. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5194368_Does_Schooling_Cause_Growth_or_the_Other_Way_Around https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5194368_Does_School...

barry-cotter 6y ago

Algeria, Tunisia, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Mexico, Argentina and Indonesia all have a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in-tertiary-education?country=FRA~DZA~ARG~BRA~CHL~TUN~ETH~IDN~VEN~BOL~MEX https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gross-enrollment-ratio-in...

tchaffee 6y ago
I can see now where you are getting your idea but that's a quantitative measure only which does not consider quality of education. The reason that 1970s Europe was better educated than Brazil or Latin America today is because of the substandard education so many will get from public secondary school and that's where their education stops. Enrollment ratio in university also doesn't say much about graduation rates. What surprised me after living in Europe and that you will not find nearly as often in Latin America, is just how well educated someone is who only attended secondary school. Your claim also included a question about why these countries are still poor. Brazil is not competing with the France of the 1970s.
- barry-cotter 6y ago
  > Your claim also included a question about why these countries are still poor. Brazil is not competing with the France of the 1970s. I made no such claim. I said that education was a consequence of economic growth, not vice versa. That is all. If you do a regression of changes in education over time versus changes in economic growth there is no trend. Changes in education do not cause changes in economic growth. That Brazil is not competing with 1970s France is irrelevant to my claim. Education is a consequence rather than a cause of growth.
  - tchaffee 6y ago
    Then I'm very confused by what you originally wrote: > Large parts of Africa and almost all of Latin America are more highly educated now than 1970s Europe and poorer than it. Brazil's economic growth has been between 5% and 10% since the 1970s. That's pretty respectable. So how can you claim which is the causation? > I said that education was a consequence of economic growth, not vice versa. > The most obvious example of economic growth not being associated with education is post Deng Xiaoping China. The huge majority had primary school education at best and the economy just kept growing and growing. From your own source, China also has a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. In fact, the chart for China looks very similar to Brazil. And with both countries "the economy just kept growing and growing." > If you do a regression of changes in education over time versus changes in economic growth there is no trend. Source? Where can we find that analysis? > That Brazil is not competing with 1970s France is irrelevant to my claim. Education is a consequence rather than a cause of growth. You don't have to look at relative education levels to understand if a competitive advantage in education leads to growth? It would be naive to claim any change in education will result in economic growth. So hopefully what we are talking about here is changes in education that lead to one country being ahead in education in some qualitative measures. At which point you would be able to understand whether or not being ahead of another country in education results in growth.
    - barry-cotter 6y ago
      > From your own source, China also has a greater proportion of the populace in third level education than France did in 1970. In fact, the chart for China looks very similar to Brazil. Yes, China got rich so it started spending money on education. That’s my point. An educated populace is a consequence of a rich one, not a cause. > Does Schooling Cause Growth or the Other Way Around? > Barro (1991) and others find that growth and schooling are highly correlated across countries, with each additional year of 1960 enrollment associated with about .6% per year faster growth in per capita GDP from 1960 to 1990. In a model with finite-lived individuals who choose schooling, schooling can influence growth, but also faster technology-driven growth can induce more schooling by raising the effective rate of return on investment in schooling. We consider a variety of evidence to determine the strength of these channels, with two main findings. First, faster-growing countries have at most modestly flatter cross-sectional experience-earnings profiles, consistent with a minority role for the channel from schooling to growth. Second, we calibrate the model using evidence from the labor literature and employ UNESCO attainment data to construct schooling going back well before 1960. > We find the channel from schooling to growth to be too weak to generate even half of Barro's coefficient under a range of plausible parameter values. The reverse channel from expected growth to schooling, in contrast, is capable of explaining the empirical relationship. We conclude that the evidence favors a dominant role for the reverse channel from growth to schooling. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5194368_Does_Schooling_Cause_Growth_or_the_Other_Way_Around https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5194368_Does_School...