Are There Skills Payoffs in Low- and Middle-Income Countries? : Empirical Evidence Using STEP Data

Valerio, Alexandria ; Sanchez Puerta, Maria Laura ; Tognatta, Namrata ; Monroy-Taborda, Sebastian

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: skills;    cognitive skills;    noncognitive skills;    labor market outcomes;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-7879
RP-ID  :  WPS7879

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Most research on the economic payoffs ofskills has used individuals' level of schoolingattained -- typically years or level of education ortraining received—as a key proxy for skills. Such researchhas consistently found that individual returns to schoolingare positive and that returns tend to be higher in low- andmiddle-income countries than in higher-income countries.However, years in school is only one proxy for skills -- arethese returns still observed using other measures asproxies? This study uses data from the STEP SkillsMeasurement Survey to examine the extent to which there isan independent association between cognitive andnoncognitive skills and earnings in low- and middle-incomecountries. The study uses measures of reading proficiencyand complexity of on-the-job computer tasks to proxycognitive skills, and personality and behavioral measures toproxy noncognitive skills. The results demonstrate that evenwhen controlling for schooling and background factors, theseskills pay off in the labor market. This is particularly thecase for the measures of cognitive skills, whilenoncognitive skills show some significant, but small,effects on earnings. The findings also suggest that there issignificant heterogeneity across countries in how skills arevalued in the labor market.