Studying pays off

The latest “Education at a Glance” report by the OECD, presented together with the Agnelli Foundation and Save the Children with Education Minister Patrizio Bianchi, took the annual snapshot of the Italian education system, comparing it to that of the organization’s other member countries. The numbers, the Courier wrote, not only seem to outline a “postwar situation,” but also show clear territorial and gender gaps.

Not just a piece of paper

If there is one certain thing that emerges from the report, it is that getting a degree always pays off, even in Italy, even more so if you are a woman. In fact, those with such a degree increase the chances of employment but also of salary. Raising one’s skill level provides a significant economic benefit, although this happens less in our country than elsewhere. Those who finish at least a bachelor’s degree are 20 percent more likely to find employment than those who stopped at eighth grade, and 6 percent more likely than a high school graduate(The Sun 24 Ore).

Sore note

The problem is that Italy has less than half as many college graduates as other countries: only 1 in 5 adults have it. Between 2000 and 2021, the study pointed out, education levels in our country grew more slowly. The share of people aged 25 to 34 with a college degree grew by 18 percentage points, compared with an average growth of 21 percentage points. Italy thus remains one of the 12 OECD countries where a bachelor’s degree is not the most common educational qualification. The delay has been known for some time, but that does not make it any less worrisome. After all, the economic benefit of having a college degree is lower than elsewhere. In OECD countries, on average, a college graduate over his or her working life comes to earn twice as much as someone without an upper secondary education.

• Italy’s college degree performance in four graphs(Lavoce).

Invest

Among the positive data in the OECD report, however, is the high percentage of children between the ages of 3 and 5 attending preschool (92 percent), a figure that places our country above the OECD average. “The new Report confirms once again that everywhere, even in Italy, studying pays off. First of all, to get better jobs and wages. But also because higher levels of education are – it adds – correlated with better health, greater participation in civic life and ability to understand each other,” says Andrea Gavosto, director of the Agnelli Foundation (The Republic).