South Africa’s economics of education: A stocktaking and an agenda for the way forward
Stellenbosch Working Paper Series No. WP06/2010Publication date: 2010
Author(s):
[protected email address] (Jet Education Services, Johannesburg)
The paper reviews some of the existing economics of education literature from the perspective of South Africa’s education policymaking needs. It also puts forward a suggested research agenda for future work. The review is arranged according to five key areas of analysis: rates of return, production functions, teacher incentives, benefit incidence, cross-country comparisons. Whilst benefit incidence analysis is able to demonstrate large improvements in the equity of public financing, cross-county comparisons reveal that not only is quality inequitably distributed, it is overall well below what the country’s level of development would predict. Production functions, especially if translated to cost effectiveness models, can point to important policy solutions. Rates of return are difficult for policymakers to interpret, and need to be viewed in the context of qualifications. Teacher incentives is a policy area that is badly in need of a better theoretical and empirical basis.
JEL Classification:I21, I28
Keywords:Economics of education, South Africa, education policy, rates of return, production functions, teacher incentives, benefit-incidence analysis
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Monday 28 July 202512:00-13:00
Dr Neil Rankin: Ceo Of Predictive Insights & Stellenbosch University
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Topic: "Two competing approaches in South African competition policy: merger control and anti-cartel enforcement over the past 30 years"
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25 Jul 2025 Budget hurdle cleared, but US tariff implementation remains a riskIt was another big week on the local political front, but with some constructive momentum. On the trade front, ahead of next week’s 1 August deadline, Trump announced another “massive” trade deal with Japan. The upcoming week is busy, with a slew of global and domestic data releases and several monetary policy decisions, including the SARB....
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