The author is concerned with the role of education as a determinant of health care choices. His central premise is that utilization of health services is determined not solely by an individual's own education, but rather by a notion of effective education, which incorporates the educational...

Preliminary evidence suggests that the rates of return to education in Venezuela have been declining since the 1970s. The authors rigorously estimate the returns to education in Venezuela for the period 1992-2002, and link them to earlier available estimates from the 1980s. They use consistent...

Returns to investment in education based on human capital theory have been estimated since the late 1950s. In the 40-plus year history of estimates of returns to investment in education, there have been several reviews of the empirical results in attempts to establish patterns. Many more...

Unrealized potential exists for increasing accountability and transparency in Chilean tertiary education by allocating resources based on achieved results rather than historical precedence and political negotiation. Against this background, the authors profile approaches to results-based funding...

The development of the institutional capacity to create and evaluate economic policies remains a critical need-and constraint-in most transition economies if they are to complete the successful passage to fully functioning market economies. To take an active role in the transition process,...

World Bank project experience on what works to improve women's access to tertiary education is so limited that it may be premature to draw firm conclusions. Many of the projects with interesting multiple interventions are ongoing. But two conclusions emerge. First, the most essential factor for...

Aid and conditionalities are the"carrots and sticks"of the conventional, direct approach to fostering economic development. The economic theory of agency is the most sophisticated treatment of the direct carrots-and-sticks approach to influencing human behavior. Considering the outcomes of the...

The authors analyze how education contributes to savings. There are many reasons to believe that education and savings may be linked, either positively or negatively. It is generally expected that people with higher education will earn greater income, thereby leading to higher savings, even if...

The authors use a nationally representative household survey to estimate returns to schooling in Venezuela from instrumental variables based on a supply-side intervention in the education market. These estimates apply to a subgroup of liquidity-constrained individuals, in the spirit of the Local...

In Eastern European countries in large social sectors such as education, inefficiency and technical deficiencies are the legacy of the old command economy. The authors examine the technical efficiency of classroom use (defined as the number of classes per classroom in one transitional economy --...