On Wednesday 3rd December, a session of the ISEG Research Seminars will take place from 13.00 to 14.00. The guest speaker will be José Pedro Pontes (ISEG), who will present the paper 'Education spread, technology, and population density'.
The ISEG Research Seminars are held every week on Wednesdays in Lecture Theatre 4 of Quelhas (4th floor), with the participation of professors from ISEG and other Portuguese and international universities.
Free admission
Abstract
We model the expansion of (higher) education in an economy composed by regions that only differ in population density. The schooling process takes place sequentially across regions in descending order of demographic density and it implies a substitution of modern industrial technologies for traditional, land-based ones.
Under the crucial assumption that young people may travel to school within the region where they live, but not across regions, the model explains why both the literacy rate and per capita income increase, albeit at a decreasing rate. Furthermore, is allows us to understand why the average students’ commuting distance tends to rise despite the geographical decentralization of the educational system.