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Literacy traps: society-wide education and individual skill premia

Using a model of O-ring production function, the paper demonstrates how certain communities can get caught in a low-literacy trap in which each individual finds it not worthwhile investing in higher skills because others are not high-skilled. The model sheds light on educational policy. It is shown that policy for promoting human capital has to take the form of a mechanism for solving the coordination failure in people's choice of educational strategy.

Using a model of O-ring production function, the paper demonstrates how certain communities can get caught in a low-literacy ...  Show Full Abstract  

Authors: Atal, Vidya; Basu, Kaushik; Gray, John;
Lee, Travis show more

Corporate authors: Institute for the Study of Labour (Germany) (IZA)
Date: 2009
Geographic subjects: North America; Canada
Resource type: Paper
Series name: IZA discussion paper
Subjects: Literacy; Skills and knowledge; Policy;
Teaching and learning show more

VITAL Object