OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 1219 China has made impressive strides in education in recent decades, even though the accumulation of human capital has lagged behind that of physical capital. Going forward, access to and quality of education will be key to sustain economic convergence with the most advanced economies and to offset the drag exerted by population ageing. This will require addressing a number of problems. Access to pre-school education is still far from universal. Migrants’ children as well as rural and poor families are still at a major disadvantage at every step of the education ladder. The focus on rote learning and exams remains excessive. More bridges are needed between vocational and general education. Graduating students often struggle to find a job matching their expectations and employers do not always find the requisite skills.

Within this context, this paper first documents the remarkable progress made so far in educational attainment, but also highlights various skills mismatches faced by new graduates entering the labour market, drawing on new survey evidence. It stresses the importance of the right incentives to innovate in universities. The paper then discusses how to improve the quality of education, which is uneven and overly focused on rote learning and exams, and how to attract and retain better teachers. The paper goes on to examine inequalities in access to good education and explores how to make the education system more inclusive to provide opportunities at all stages to all, and flexible enough to adapt in the face of ongoing structural change. The paper highlights some of the key policy challenges faced by China in providing the right skills to all and proposes measures to address them.

DOI: 10.1787/5js1j18g4tlx-en