LEARNING AND EARNING

New data demonstrate how graduates can expect earn much more than non-graduates, by sex and by country.

A SPELL at university offers more than the chance to indulge in a few years of debauchery. But precisely how rewarding, financially, is completing your degree? A new report from the OECD, a rich-country think-tank, attempts to measure how much more graduates can expect to earn compared with those who seek jobs without similar qualifications. In America the lifetime gross earnings of male graduates are, on average, nearly $370,000 higher than those of non-graduates, comfortably repaying the pricey investment in a university education. Female graduates earn an extra $229,000, the lower rate perhaps because women are more likely to drop out of the workforce to look after children.

On average it pays well to study: across the OECD countries studied a man can expect to make an additional $186,500 in his lifetime if he has a degree. In som places , such as South Korea and Spain, the data show that female graduates pull in more than their male counterparts. In turkey, graduates' additional wages are more modest and the financial advantages of men over women are less pronounced.

                                                                 (See and other daily charts at:

                                                                                   Economist.com/dailychart)