This paper investigates relative earnings of individuals leaving tertiary education without a degree across 18 European countries employing survey data on adult workers. We find that, on average, university dropouts earn 8% more than those never enrolling into tertiary education, but 25% less than university graduates. Moreover, university dropouts do not appear to have better employment chances than other upper secondary graduates while they have a significantly lower employment probability than those graduating from tertiary education. However, we document substantial heterogeneity across countries concerning whether university attendance without completion is rewarded in the labour market.
BERLINGIERI Francesco;
BOLZ Theresa;
2026-05-18
CARFAX PUBLISHING LTD.
JRC141987
1469-5782 (online),
https://doi.org/10.1080/09645292.2025.2518379,
https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC141987,
10.1080/09645292.2025.2518379 (online),
| Name | Country | City | Type |
|---|
This document is only visible at the Commission level.
You are not authorized to publish or distribute it outside the European Commission.
This is a public document. You can share this publication.
Datasets
| ID | Title | Public URL |
|---|
Dataset collections
| ID | Acronym | Title | Public URL |
|---|
Scripts / source codes
| Description | Public URL |
|---|
Additional supporting files
| File name | Description | File type |
|---|