International Measures of Schooling Years and Schooling Quality 1960-1990

This study provides an update on measures of educational attainment for a broad cross section of countries. In our previous work (Barro and Lee, 1993), we constructed estimates of educational attainment by sex for persons aged 25 and over. The values applied to 129 countries over a five-year intervals from 1960 to 1985.

The present study adds census information for 1985 and 1990 and updates the estimates of educational attainment to 1990. We also have been able to add a few countries, notably China, which were previously omitted because of missing data.

Dataset:

Educational attainment at various levels for the male and female population. The data set includes estimates of educational attainment for the population by age - over age 15 and over age 25 - for 126 countries in the world. (see Barro, Robert and J.W. Lee, "International Measures of Schooling Years and Schooling Quality, AER, Papers and Proceedings, 86(2), pp. 218-223 and also see "International Data on Education", manuscipt.) Data are presented quinquennially for the years 1960-1990;

Educational quality across countries. Table 1 presents data on measures of schooling inputs at five-year intervals from 1960 to 1990. Table 2 contains the data on average test scores for the students of the different age groups for the various subjects.Please see Jong-Wha Lee and Robert J. Barro, "Schooling Quality in a Cross-Section of Countries," (NBER Working Paper No.w6198, September 1997) for more detailed explanation and sources of data.