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The Risk-Return Trade-Off in Human Capital Investment

Author

Listed:
  • Charlotte Christiansen
  • Juanna Schröter Joensen

    (Department of Economics, University of Aarhus, Denmark)

Abstract

In this paper we analyze investments in human capital assets in a way which is standard for financial assets, but not (yet) for human capital assets. We study mean-variance plots of human capital assets. We compare the properties of human capital returns using a performance measure and by sing tests for mean-variance spanning. A risk-return trade-off is revealed, hich is not only related to the length of education but also to the type of education. We identify a range of educations that are efficient in terms of investment goods, and a range of educations that are inefficient, and may be chosen for consumption purposes.

Suggested Citation

  • Charlotte Christiansen & Juanna Schröter Joensen, 2006. "The Risk-Return Trade-Off in Human Capital Investment," Economics Working Papers 2006-02, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    • Handle: RePEc:aah:aarhec:2006-02
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Educational Choice; Efficient Frontier; Human Capital Investment; Mean-Variance Analysis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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