Technical Efficiency of Public Education and R&D Expenditures in Selected EU and OECD Countries : A Non-Parametric Analysis

The paper attempts to measure relative (technical) efficiency in utilizing public education and R&D expenditures in selected EU and OECD countries. As resources allocated to education and R&D sector are significantly limited, a special emphasis should be given to their efficient use regarding the institutional and legal constraints. By applying non-parametric methodology, i.e. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a relative efficiency is defined as the deviation from the efficiency frontier which represents the maximum output/outcome attainable from each input level. An analysis of (output-oriented) efficiency measures shows that Japan, Korea and Finland seem to be the most efficient countries in the field of education sector, while Switzerland and Netherlands dominate in the field of R&D sector, even if for different reasons. The empirical results also suggest that, in general, emerging market economies in the EU and OECD regions significantly lag behind in the relative efficiency measures, in particular in R&D sector