Give it time: Education affects economic growth in the long term

Using a data set for a panel of 118 countries, this paper shows that changes in the level of education of national populations ages 45 to 64 are positively associated with economic growth. An increase of one percentage point in the share of individuals in this age group who attended secondary education is associated with a 1.1% increase in GDP per capita, although the effect is stronger for developing countries. In contrast, variation in the level of education in younger cohorts is not positively associated with economic growth. These results suggest that investment in education benefits society, but only in the long-term. Several possible explanations for this finding are discussed