Do skills protect against exclusion in adult ages, and how important are the skills acquired before the age of 16 years versus those acquired later on? We match the scores on numeracy and literacy skills from the 2011 PIAAC for young adults backwards to grade point average (GPA) data from compulsory school education, measured at the age of 16…

We examine if the OECD survey of adult skills, PIAAC, can provide information about the relative quality of education and training in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. We find that the average population scores are inappropriate while the mean scores of natives well approximate the skills of individuals that had the chance to attend the…

This article focuses on low-performing adult readers in the Scandinavian countries, seeking to identify and describe some of the literacy-related problems that they face. Following a presentation of the Reading Components Assessment (RCA) used in PIAAC (Program for International Assessment of Adult Competencies), we provide profiles for those…

The present study aims at investigating the long-term cognitive effects of vocational education and training (VET) in Sweden and Denmark using data from the PIAAC Survey of Adult Skills. While Sweden has moved towards a more academic vocational education, Denmark has kept the apprenticeship system. Using multiple regression analysis we estimate…