Educational Mismatch: A Human Development Study

The seminal work focusing on the study of educational mismatch dates back to the 70s (Freeman, 1976) , when the concern in the United States about how much the state should be subsidizing education in order to have a competitive nation was arisen. Since then, using different methods and databases, several researchers have analysed the impact of education in one’s human capital (i.e. Quintini, 2011; Leuven and Oosberbeek, 2011). Not too much has been advanced since then, and after the global financial meltdown, countries have focused on implementing fast remedies to alleviate the rise in unemployment at the lowest economic cost (Pilz, 2012). Following the human capital principles as developed by Becker (1967) and Mincer (1972), human capital

Contrarily, it is within this concern on out-puts where the impossibility of a significant part of young people in Europe, and particularly in Spain, to find a job is seen as an individual failure. And the dis-course of mismatch is put as the result of consecutive bad educational choices. Whilst, mismatch is an economic problem, the paper analyses it from a human development perspective. Using the term of capability as a genuine opportunity as developed by Sen (1999, 2009), individual freedom is understood in the ability to pursue valuable choices for one and for others. Thus, being individual freedom the ultimate end of policies. Consequently, the issue presented here is not about measuring the level of education against the category of job performed (mismatch), but rather the job performed against the aspirations and career prospects of the individual. The Informational Basis of the Judgment of Justice (IBJJ) as introduced by Sen (1990) widens the area of concern and moves from having skills, economics and the labour market as the sole end of policies to include aspirations and well-being as core-matters. On the field of VET this shift on purposes opens up to a bigger debate about the role of this education to serve not only the market but at foremost the individual. Additionally it provides a consequent reflexion about the effects of mismatch beyond economics. Addressing the issue of mismatch from a structural perspective evidences that current policies that are focused on the supply side, emphasize individual human capital and aggravate the sense of individual responsibility. An analysis that changes the heuristic frame of reference from economics to human well-being, puts attention on the consequences of mismatch for the economy but also for the individual as well as it is able to provide integrated solutions that go beyond “making VET more