Sep 21, 2003

Articles in journals

St. Aubyn, M.

26

26

Public expenditure in Portugal has been growing in recent years and approached values close to the EU average. Social expenditure, namely with education, increased in relative terms. Also, recent growth in public employment resulted greatly from new hirings in this sector. Taxation is the dominant source of financing education. Evaluating efficiency in this sector is of great importance for public policy--an inefficient situation will imply the possibility of a better performance without increasing allocated resources. Education enrolment rates have progressed along with expenditure growth, school expectancy in Portugal being close to EU average values. Even if average expenditure per student is lower than the EU average, results presented here point towards inefficiency in this sector. Graduation rates at the end of secondary education are too low and Portuguese student performance is disappointing at an international level. It is suggested that promoting efficiency in this sector should include a careful examination and reassessment of teaching standards in secondary schools, namely in key knowledge areas, a careful and open assessment of school performance, a review of personnel management and payments policy, a review of the breakdown of educational expenditures by resource category and the development of a life-long education program.

Education,National Government Expenditures,Human Capital,