Higher Education ‘Market’ in Portugal: a diagnosis

The higher education system in Portugal, in recent decades, experienced profound structural changes, including a substantial increase in the number of higher education institutions, scattered throughout the country, with a growing number of students and teachers. The subject of this study is to examine the characteristics of current supply and demand within the higher education subsystem, in Portugal. The methodological approach includes two steps: first, making a characterization of key variables that shape demand and supply of higher education in Portugal and, second, using spatial econometric analysis, particularly multidimensional scaling, in order to estimate the location of universities.