Macroeconomic and School Variables to Reveal Country Choices of General and Vocational Education: A Cross-Country Analysis with focus on Arab Economies

Abstract This research focuses on the analysis of the determinants of general and vocational educational choices in Arab economies with comparisons to other regions of the world. The selected framework considers educational choices as influenced by macroeconomic and education variables. The empirical investigation is based on regression analysis as inspired by the above model. Time series analysis is also used for Arab countries. The results indicate that education in the groups of countries analyzed is generally driven by unemployment, economic growth, and the schooling results. Arab countries do show that vocational educational accounts for the schooling performance, only. Comparisons with other groups indicate that Arab countries need to strengthen the links between general and professional education as this allows for a more balanced educational and employment systems, not accounting only for the performance of general education