Indicator A3. How does educational attainment affect participation in the labour market?
On average across OECD countries, the employment rate increases as educational attainment increases. Among 25-64 year-olds, the employment rate is 59% for those with below upper secondary attainment. This rises to 77% for adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and 86% for those with tertiary attainment.
High-quality vocational education can facilitate the transition from school to work. On average in OECD countries, the employment rate for younger adults (25-34 year-olds) with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education as their highest attainment is 83% for those with a vocational qualification and 73% for those with a general one.
In the vast majority of OECD countries, employment rates among 25-34 year-old women are lower than for men of this age group, regardless of educational attainment. However, the difference falls as educational attainment increases. On average across OECD countries, only 47% of 25-34 year-old women without upper secondary education are employed, 24 percentage points below their male peers. The gap narrows to 14 percentage points for those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and to 6 percentage points for those with a tertiary degree.
Context
Modern economies depend on a supply of highly skilled workers and these workers in turn reap labour-market benefits. These advantages, combined with expanded education opportunities, have encouraged individuals across the OECD to acquire more skills via attaining higher levels of education. As demand for skills has increased, labour markets have absorbed the growing number of highly skilled workers and continue to provide them with better employment prospects. In contrast, the labour-market prospects for adults with lower levels of qualifications are more challenging. Those with lower educational qualifications earn less (see Indicator A4) and are at greater risk of unemployment. Automation could mean the disappearance of 14% of existing jobs, an estimate that varies significantly across countries (from 7% in Norway to 35% in the Slovak Republic) (Georgieff and Milanez, 2021[1]). New technologies, such as generative artificial intelligence, are increasing the range of jobs that could potentially be automated.
Education systems need to respond to the labour-market challenges of today and prepare students for the labour markets of the future. Labour-market outcomes by level of educational attainment are among the most important headline measures of the links between education and economic opportunities for individuals. They show the types of qualifications that are in demand by employers and can help governments to better understand global trends and anticipate how their economies may evolve in the coming years.
Vocational programmes are often seen as a tool to facilitate the transition from school to work. In most OECD countries vocational programmes are part of the upper secondary offer, while in some countries occupational preparation is postponed to post-secondary and tertiary levels. A key question is how graduates of vocational programmes succeed in the labour market, both when they start their working life and later on, as their career progresses and they are faced with changing demands for skills and need to adapt.
Other findings
Unemployment rates among younger adults with a tertiary degree are around 2 percentage points lower than for those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and 8 percentage points lower than for young adults with below upper secondary attainment on average across OECD countries.
Women aged 25 to 34 with a vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary as their highest level of educational attainment also have lower employment rates than similarly educated men of this age group. On average across OECD countries, 74% of 25-34 year-old women who attained a vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programme are employed, compared to 89% of their male peers. This is a similar sized gender gap in employment rates as among those with general upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment: 66% for younger women compared to 80% for younger men.
Vocational qualifications are associated with lower inactivity rates than general qualifications. Across OECD countries, 12% of 24-35 year-old adults with vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education as their highest attainment are inactive, while the share reaches 21% for those with a general qualification.
There continues to be a strong relationship between labour-market participation and educational attainment that holds whether participation is measured by employment, unemployment, or inactivity rates. This relationship exists in nearly all OECD and partner countries with available data. It is very rare to find a country where a subpopulation with lower educational attainment has higher labour-market participation rates than a subpopulation with higher educational attainment. On average across OECD countries, employment rates rise from about 60% for 25-34 year-olds without an upper secondary attainment to 86% for those with a tertiary qualification, while unemployment rates fall from 13% to 5% and inactivity rates from 31% to 9% (Table A3.2, Table A3.3 and Table A3.4).
This positive relationship between education and the labour market holds for both men and women (Table A3.2) and has been stable over the decades, despite the strong increase in attainment levels across the OECD (OECD, 2022[3]).
The analysis in this Indicator focuses on educational attainment. It should be noted that in some cases a person might have achieved one level of educational attainment but still be in education and therefore their educational attainment is likely to increase at a later stage. This is particularly important when analysing labour-market outcomes for 25-34 year-olds, who may still be in education or may return to education and change their employability.
Educational attainment and employment
Educational attainment and employment rates are strongly correlated. Upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education is often seen as the minimum educational attainment for successful labour-market participation for most individuals (OECD, 2021[4]). Employment rates among adults (25-64 year-olds) with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment are much higher than for those with below upper secondary attainment. On average, only 59% of 25-64 year-olds with below upper secondary attainment are employed in OECD countries, rising to 77% of those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment. The employment rate among adults with tertiary attainment is even higher, at 87%. However, the employment premium (i.e. difference in employment rates) moving from below upper secondary attainment to upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment varies markedly across OECD and partner countries, ranging from 5 percentage points or less in Colombia, India and Indonesia to 47 percentage points in the Slovak Republic (Table A3.1).
By programme orientation
The type of programme pursued also affects employment rates. In the majority of OECD and partner countries, upper secondary and post-secondary non-tertiary education consists of both general and vocational programmes. Across OECD countries, 22% of younger adults attained a vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education and 18% attained a general one (see Indicator A1). Vocational attainment can be associated with strong employability in the labour market. On average in OECD countries, the employment rate among younger adults who achieved upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education as their highest attainment is 83% for those with a vocational qualification and 73% for those with a general one (Table A3.2). Lower employment rates for younger adults with general qualifications can be linked to the fact that general programmes are often designed to prepare students for tertiary studies, while vocational programmes focus on developing job-specific skills, preparing students to enter the labour market. Some countries have vocational programmes with a strong and integrated work-based learning component at upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary level. For example, in France, Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland, above 70% of 20-34 year-olds with a vocational qualification obtained work experience longer than a month while completing their programme (see Box A1.1 in Indicator A1).
On average across OECD countries, adults who have a bachelor’s or equivalent degree as their highest level of education have an employment rate of 85%. In many OECD countries, this may underestimate eventual employment rates as some of this age group will still be enrolled in education. However, getting a bachelor’s or equivalent degree does not improve employment rates in all OECD and partner countries. Indeed, in most countries where the employment rate for adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary vocational attainment reaches 85% or more, attaining a bachelor’s or equivalent degree does not increase employment rates by more than 2 percentage points (Figure A3.1).
Vocational short-cycle tertiary programmes are more common than general ones in most countries where this level of education exists (see Indicator A1). On average across the OECD, 25-64 year-olds with short-cycle tertiary attainment have almost the same employment rates as those with a bachelor’s or equivalent degree. However, this average hides large variations across countries. In the Czech Republic and New Zealand, short-cycle tertiary graduates that have this educational level as their highest level of attainment have higher employment rates than those with a bachelor’s or master’s or equivalent degree, while in other countries they have lower rates. In a few countries, the employment rates of short-cycle tertiary graduates that have this educational level as their highest level of attainment are barely higher than those with upper secondary attainment (Table A3.1). However, there is still a benefit to pursuing a short-cycle tertiary qualification in terms of wage gains (see Indicator A4).
By gender and programme orientation
While the link between educational attainment and employment rates holds for both men and women, it is particularly strong for women, for every additional level of education. In 2022, among younger adults, only 47% of women with below upper secondary attainment were employed, compared to 70% for those whose highest level of attainment is upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary and 84% of those with tertiary attainment. For younger men the biggest employment gain comes from getting an upper secondary education: from an employment rate of 70% for those with below upper secondary attainment to 85% for those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and 90% with a tertiary education (Table A3.2). The large gender difference among younger adults with below upper secondary attainment is unlikely to be solely due to employability. The persistence of traditional gender roles may also shape these results. Women who expect to stay home to take care of a family instead of pursuing a career have less incentive to obtain a formal education and are therefore more likely to have low educational attainment. Across the OECD, this is reflected in inactivity rates for younger women with below upper secondary attainment that are on average more than twice as high as for men and resulting low employment rates (Table A3.2 and Table A3.4).
On average across OECD and partner countries, 25-34 year-old women have lower employment rates than their male peers, regardless of educational attainment but these gender disparities narrow as educational attainment increases. On average across OECD countries, the gender difference in employment rates among 25-34 year-olds without upper secondary education is 25 percentage points. The difference shrinks to 15 percentage points among those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education as their highest attainment and 6 percentage points among those with tertiary attainment. In the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic, gender differences in employment rates by educational attainment are significant, varying by more than 5 percentage points across educational attainment levels (Table A3.2).
On average across OECD countries, the gender gap in employment rates among younger adults with vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment has hardly changed between 2015 and 2022. In all OECD and partner countries, younger men with this level of educational attainment had higher employment rates than younger women with the same level of education, in both 2015 and 2022. In 2015, 66% of women and 84% of men with this level of education as their highest attainment were employed and in 2022, it was 70% for women and 85% for men. Since 2015, the gap has widened in 10 OECD countries. This was most marked in Canada, Costa Rica, Greece and Latvia where the difference in employment rates between men and women increased by between 5 and 16 percentage points. Australia, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Israel and the Slovak Republic saw the largest reduction in this gap, by between 7 and 16 percentage points (Figure A3.2)
Among younger adults with below upper secondary education as their highest level of attainment, the gender gap in employment rates narrowed by 2 percentage points on average across OECD countries between 2015 and 2022. About 20 OECD countries registered a decrease in the gender gap, with Lithuania and Luxembourg seeing the largest fall, of 20 percentage points. This trend is also apparent among younger adults with tertiary education, who saw the average gender gap narrow by 3 percentage points over the same period (Table A3.2).
Educational attainment and unemployment rates
In the large majority of countries, unemployment rates decrease as educational attainment increases. In many OECD and partner countries, unemployment rates (i.e. adults without work, actively seeking employment and currently available to start work, as a percentage of the labour force) are especially high among younger adults with lower educational attainment levels. Measuring unemployment rates for young people can be challenging because many of them are still in education or training programmes and may not be actively seeking employment. To address this challenge, Education at a Glance uses alternative measures such as the percentage of young people who are neither employed nor in education or training (NEET) in Indicator A2 in addition to the comparison of unemployment rates that follows.
On average across OECD countries, the unemployment rate for 25-34 year-olds lacking upper secondary education is 12.8%, almost twice as high as for those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment (7.3%). The situation is especially severe for younger adults without upper secondary education in the Slovak Republic and South Africa, where more than 35% of this group are unemployed. The rate is also high in Belgium, Greece, and Spain, where more than 20% of younger adults without upper secondary attainment are unemployed (Table A3.3).
Having upper secondary education or post-secondary non-tertiary education as the highest level of education attained reduces the risk of unemployment in most OECD and partner countries. In Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Slovak Republic, Sweden and Switzerland, the unemployment rate for younger adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment is one-third or less than the rate for younger adults with below upper secondary attainment (Table A3.3).
In most OECD and partner countries, among younger adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment, those with a vocational qualification have lower risk of unemployment than those with a general one, even though the difference on average across OECD remains small (less than 2 percentage-point). The difference in unemployment rates is most pronounced in Costa Rica, Finland and the Netherlands, where it reaches 5-7 percentage points (Table A3.3).
On average in OECD countries, 25-34 year-olds with a tertiary degree have an unemployment rate of 4.9% The positive effect of tertiary education on unemployment rates is particularly high in Argentina, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Finland, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, the Slovak Republic, and the United States. In these countries, unemployment rates among tertiary-educated younger adults are less than half of those of younger adults which have upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment (Table A3.3).
However, in some countries there are exceptions to the relationship between greater educational attainment and lower unemployment, especially for those with vocational education as their highest level of education. In Costa Rica, Denmark, Mexico, the Netherlands and the Republic of Türkiye (hereafter “Türkiye”), young adults with vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment have lower unemployment rates than their peers with a bachelor’s or equivalent degree (Figure A3.3).
Educational attainment and labour-market inactivity
While unemployment receives most public attention, the economic inactivity rate – the share of people who are neither working nor actively looking for a job – is another important measure of labour-market participation. On average across OECD countries, 31% of 25-34 year-olds who have not completed upper secondary education are inactive. The share falls to 16% for those with an upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and 9% for those with tertiary attainment (Table A3.4).
Across OECD countries, among younger adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education as their highest attainment, 12% of those with a vocational qualification are inactive, compared to 21% of those with a general qualification. This rate falls to 11% for those with a bachelor’s or equivalent degree. In Austria, the Czech Republic, Iceland, Italy, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, and Spain, younger adults who completed a vocational upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programme as their highest level of attainment have lower inactivity rates than those with a bachelor's or equivalent degree (Table A3.4).
Younger women have consistently higher inactivity rates than younger men across all attainment levels except for tertiary-educated women in Portugal, but the rates are especially high among those who have not completed upper secondary education. On average across OECD countries, the gender difference in inactivity rates is about 25 percentage points for 25-34 year-olds with below upper secondary attainment, compared to 15 percentage points among those with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment and 6 percentage points for those with tertiary attainment (Figure A3.4).
Inactivity rates among women can be influenced by a variety of factors, such as the opportunity to work part-time. Part-time work can offer greater flexibility to balance work and other obligations, which may be especially important for women who have caregiving responsibilities, such as taking care of children or elderly relatives. However, part-time work often comes with lower wages, fewer benefits and limited opportunities for advancement, which can make it difficult for women to achieve economic security.
Labour market outcomes by subnational regions
Adults with higher educational attainment tend to have more homogeneous employment rates across regions. In Australia for example, employment rates for 25-64 year-olds with below upper secondary attainment range from 54% in Canberra, to 63% in Western Australia, but for those with a tertiary education the range was only from 82% in Tasmania to 89% in Northern Territory in 2021 (OECD, 2023[5]).
Despite the concentration of economic activity in the capital city regions, in most countries, these regions do not generally have the highest employment rates. However, for tertiary-educated adults, the employment rate in the capital city region does tend to be slightly higher than the unweighted average of all regions in a country. In Greece, for example, the employment rate for adults with tertiary attainment in the capital city region of Attica is about 5 percentage points higher than the unweighted average of all Greece’s regions (OECD, 2023[5]).
Regional variation in employment rates among adults with upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary attainment can be significant among OECD and partner countries with available data. In Italy, there is a difference of 30 percentage points between the lowest region, Calabria (53%) and the highest, the Province of Bolzano-Bozen (83%). Similarly, in Colombia, there was a 24 percentage-point difference between the region of Chocó (51%) and Nariño (75%) in 2020. However, in other countries like the Czech Republic, Germany or the United Kingdom, regional differences do not exceed 10 percentage points. For tertiary attainment, the country with the highest regional variation among adults is Chile, recording a 20 percentage-point difference between the region of O'Higgins (25%) and Santiago Metropolitan (45%) in 2020 (OECD, 2023[5]).
Age groups: Adults refer to 25-64 year-olds; younger adults refer to 25-34 year-olds.
Educational attainment refers to the highest level of education successfully completed by an individual.
Employed individuals are those who, during the survey reference week, were either working for pay or profit for at least one hour or had a job but were temporarily not at work. The employment rate refers to the number of persons in employment as a percentage of the population.
Inactive individuals are those who, during the survey reference week, were outside the labour force and classified neither as employed nor as unemployed. Individuals enrolled in education are also considered as inactive if they are not looking for a job. The inactivity rate refers to inactive persons as a percentage of the population (i.e. the number of inactive people is divided by the number of the population of the same age group).
Labour force (active population) is the total number of employed and unemployed persons, in accordance with the definition in the Labour Force Survey.
Levels of education: See the Reader’s Guide at the beginning of this publication for a presentation of all ISCED 2011 levels.
Unemployed individuals are those who, during the survey reference week, were without work, actively seeking employment and currently available to start work. The unemployment rate refers to unemployed persons as a percentage of the labour force (i.e. the number of unemployed people is divided by the sum of employed and unemployed people).
For information on methodology, see Indicator A1. Note that the employment rates do not take into account the number of hours worked.
For more information see Source section and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]).
For information on sources, see Indicator A1.
Data on subnational regions for selected indicators are available in the OECD Regional Statistics (database) (OECD, 2023[5])
References
[1] Georgieff, A. and A. Milanez (2021), “What happened to jobs at high risk of automation?”, OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 255.
[2] OECD (2023), Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/d7f76adc-en.
[5] OECD (2023), OECD Regional Database - Education, https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=REGION_EDUCAT (accessed on 20 July 2022).
[3] OECD (2022), Education at a Glance Database - Educational attainment and labour-force status, http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?datasetcode=EAG_NEAC (accessed on 20 July 2022).
[4] OECD (2021), Education at a Glance 2021: OECD Indicators, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/b35a14e5-en.
Cut-off date for the data: 15 June 2023. Any updates on data can be found on line at: https://doi.org/10.1787/eag-data-en. More breakdowns can also be found at: http://stats.oecd.org, Education at a Glance Database.
Table A3.1. Employment rates of 25-64 year-olds, by educational attainment (2022) |
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Percentage of employed 25-64 year-olds among all 25-64 year-olds |
 |
Note: See StatLink and Box A3.1 for the notes related to this Table. |
Source: OECD/ILO (2023). For more information see Source section and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]). |
Table A3.2. Trends in employment rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment, programme orientation and gender (2015 and 2022) |
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Percentage of employed 25-34 year-olds among all 25-34 year-olds |
 |
Note: See StatLink and Box A3.1 for the notes related to this Table. |
Source: OECD/ILO (2023). For more information see Source section and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]). |
Table A3.3. Unemployment rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment and programme orientation (2022) |
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Percentage of unemployed 25-34 year-olds among all 25-34 year-olds in the labour force |
 |
Note: See StatLink and Box A3.1 for the notes related to this Table. |
Source: OECD/ILO (2023). For more information see Source section and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]). |
Table A3.4. Inactivity rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment and programme orientation (2022) |
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Percentage of inactive 25-34 year-olds among all 25-34 year-olds |
 |
Note: See StatLink and Box A3.1 for the notes related to this Table. |
Source: OECD/ILO (2023). For more information see Source section and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]). |
Box A3.1. Notes for Indicators A3 Tables
Table A3.1. Employment rates of 25-64 year-olds, by educational attainment (2022)
In most countries data refer to ISCED 2011. For Argentina and India data refer to ISCED-97.
1. Year of reference differs from 2022: 2021 for Argentina and 2020 for Chile.
2. Data for tertiary education include upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programmes (less than 5% of adults are in this group).
3. Data for upper secondary attainment include completion of a sufficient volume and standard of programmes that would be classified individually as completion of intermediate upper secondary programmes (12% of adults aged 25-64 are in this group).
Table A3.2. Trends in employment rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment, programme orientation and gender (2015 and 2022)
In most countries data refer to ISCED 2011. For Argentina and India data refer to ISCED-97. Totals for men and women are available for consultation on line (see StatLink).
1. Year of reference differs from 2022: 2021 for Argentina and 2020 for Chile.
2. Data for tertiary education include upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programmes (less than 5% of adults are in this group).
3. Data for upper secondary attainment include completion of a sufficient volume and standard of programmes that would be classified individually as completion of intermediate upper secondary programmes (9% of adults aged 25-34 are in this group).
4. Year of reference differs from 2015: 2014 for Argentina and 2012 for India.
Table A3.3. Unemployment rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment and programme orientation (2022)
In most countries data refer to ISCED 2011. For Argentina and India data refer to ISCED-97.
1. Year of reference differs from 2022: 2021 for Argentina and 2020 for Chile.
2. Data for tertiary education include upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programmes (less than 5% of adults are in this group).
3. Data for upper secondary attainment include completion of a sufficient volume and standard of programmes that would be classified individually as completion of intermediate upper secondary programmes (9% of adults aged 25-34 are in this group).
Table A3.4. Inactivity rates of 25-34 year-olds, by educational attainment and programme orientation (2022)
In most countries data refer to ISCED 2011. For Argentina and India data refer to ISCED-97.
1. Year of reference differs from 2022: 2021 for Argentina and 2020 for Chile.
2. Data for tertiary education include upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary programmes (less than 5% of adults are in this group).
3. Data for upper secondary attainment include completion of a sufficient volume and standard of programmes that would be classified individually as completion of intermediate upper secondary programmes (9% of adults aged 25-34 are in this group).
For more information see Definitions, Methodology and Source sections and Education at a Glance 2023 Sources, Methodologies and Technical Notes (OECD, 2023[2]).
Data and more breakdowns are available in the Education at a Glance Database (http://stats.oecd.org/).
Please refer to the Reader's Guide for information concerning symbols for missing data and abbreviations.