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Seminar in Economics | with Andrea Ichino

Department of Economics welcomes you to a seminar with Andrea Ichino, European University Institute.

Welcome to this Higher Seminar in Economics organized by the Department of Economics, SSE. The seminar speaker is Andrea Ichino, a Professor of Economics at the European University Institute in Fiesole who will present "College education, intelligence, and disadvantage: policy lessons from the UK in 1960-2004".

Abstract

University access has greatly expanded during the past decades and further growth f igures prominently in political agendas. We study possible consequences of historical and future expansions in a stochastic, general equilibrium Roy model where tertiary educational attainment is determined by intelligence and disadvantage from low socioeconomic status or poor non-cognitive skills. The enlargement of university access enacted in the UK following the 1963 Robbins Report provides an ideal case study to draw lessons for the future. We find that this expansion led to the selection into college of progressively less intelligent students from advantaged backgrounds and to a declining college wage premium across cohorts. Our structural estimates indicate that the implemented policy was unfit to reach high-ability, disadvantaged individuals as Robbins had instead advocated. We show that counterfactual meritocratic selection policies would have attained that goal and so would have also been progressive.

 

The seminar takes place at Stockholm School of Economics, Sveavägen 65, room 350.

Please contact fanni.antal@hhs.se if you have any questions.

Dept. of Economics Economics Seminar in economics