Indicator 18. Educational Attainment in the Adult Population

In 2008, a greater percentage of 25- to 34-year-old females than males had completed higher education in every reporting G-8 country. The largest difference by sex was reported in Canada (16 percentage points), followed by the United States, Italy, and France (all 9 percentage points).

This indicator compares the highest levels of education attained by adults ages 25 to 64 in 2008 and also examines rates of young adult (ages 25 to 34) completion of higher education by sex.

Results for adults ages 25 to 64 were analyzed at three levels of educational attainment: lower secondary education or below, upper secondary education,²⁰ and higher education. Italy was the only reporting G-8 country in which the largest percentage (46 percent) of adults had completed lower secondary education or below as their highest level of educational attainment (figure 18-1). In Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States, and France, the largest percentage of adults had completed upper secondary education as their highest level of education.²¹ In Canada, the largest percentage of adults had completed higher education (49 percent). Higher education includes (1) programs that are intended to provide sufficient qualifications to gain entry into advanced research programs and professions with high skill requirements (in the United States, this includes bachelor's, master's, and first professional degree programs); (2) programs that provide a higher level of career and technical education and are designed to prepare students for the labor market (in the United States, this includes associate's degree programs); and (3) doctoral programs that usually require the completion of a research thesis or dissertation. In the other reporting G-8 countries, the percentage of adults who had completed higher education ranged from 14 percent in Italy to 43 percent in Japan. In the United States, 41 percent of adults had completed higher education. In most G-8 countries, greater percentages of young adults (ages 25 to 34) had completed higher education than the larger population of adults ages 25 to 64. For example, in Japan, 55 percent of 25- to 34-year-olds had completed higher education, compared with 43 percent of 25- to 64-year-olds; in Canada, 56 percent of 25- to 34-year-olds had completed higher education, compared with 49 percent of 25- to 64-year-olds; and in France, 41 percent of 25- to 34-year-olds had completed higher education, compared with 27 percent of 25- to 64-year-olds (figures 18-1 and 18-2). Both age groups had similar percentages of higher education completion in Germany (24 and 25 percent) and the United States (42 and 41 percent).

In the United States, more bachelor's degrees have been awarded to women than to men since about the early 1980s (Snyder and Dillow 2011, table 279). Among 25- to 34-year-olds in the United States in 2008, about 37 percent of males and 46 percent of females had completed higher education (figure 18-2). A greater percentage of 25- to 34-year-old females than males had completed higher education in every reporting G-8 country. The largest difference by sex was reported in Canada (16 percentage points), followed by the United States, Italy, and France (all 9 percentage points).

Among 25- to 34-year-olds in the G-8 countries, differences favoring females in higher education completion were generally more consistent and pronounced in 2008 compared to several years prior. For example, in 2001, a greater percentage of 25- to 34-year-old males than females in the United Kingdom and Germany had completed higher education (a difference of 1 and 3 percentage points, respectively) (OECD 2002). In 2001, higher education completion in Italy, Japan, and France differed in favor of females by 3 to 5 percentage points; in 2008, these differences ranged from 7 to 9 percentage points (figure 18-2).

Definitions and Methodology

As shown in the figures, education levels are defined according to the 1997 International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED97). For more information on the ISCED97 levels, see appendix A.

Male-female percentage-point differences in higher education completion presented in the text were computed from unrounded numbers; therefore, they may differ from computations made using the rounded whole numbers that appear in figure 18-2.

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²⁰ In this indicator, the category of “upper secondary education” also includes postsecondary nontertiary programs. See figure 18-1 and appendix A for more information on education levels.
²¹ Although the figure suggests that the largest percentage of adults in Japan had completed upper secondary education as their highest level of education, this assertion is not verifiable because in Japan the data for preprimary education, primary education, and lower secondary education are included in the data for upper secondary education.