Inequality of Education in Turkey: A Comparison of Demographic Groups

Serdar Polat , Presidency of Turkey, Presidency of Strategy and Budget
Ahmet Sinan Turkyilmaz, Hacettepe University

This paper investigates how the demographic distribution of human capital - defined as educational attainment - evolves over time. With four waves of TDHS data, we analyze educational inequality for the adult population in Turkey to understand whether mass education expansion has benefited different demographic groups equally or not. Also, using decomposition techniques, we explore the relative shares of overall education inequality with respect to between and within variation for gender, residence, neighborhood, region, migration and marriage status. Over the concerned period, the human capital level has improved and its distribution has become more equal. Increased educational attainment for young cohorts and for females may be considered as the main drivers. However, there are reverse factors that weaken the expected improvement. Keywords: Educational inequality; demographic groups; decomposition; cohort; Turkey

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 Presented in Session P3. Poster Session Migration, Economics, Environment, Methods, History and Policy