@techreport{5e4e261fa74a4e04b8bbd523186285ab,
title = "Education and the Transition from Communism",
abstract = "We use OECD-PISA data on a standardized international reading test to evaluate the performance of 15-year olds n five countries in transition from communism: Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, Latvia and Russia. Parental education contributes strongly to performance as do other indicators of parental quality such as books in the household and interacting with children. Wealth effects are mixed; possessions associated with intellectual activity such as calculators help while pure conveniences such as dishwashers actually harm performance. Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland outperform Latvia and Russia with the differences largely due to the relative performance of the students with the most favorable backgrounds.",
keywords = "Transition, Education, Parental Effects",
author = "M Spagat and K Iliasova",
note = "This paper was prepared for NCEEER grant {"}Taking stock of Human Capital in the Post-Communist World: Education Issues in Transition Economies.{"}<br /> <br /> {"}All Happy families are alike.<br /> Unhappy families are unhappy in their own way.{"}<br /> - Tolstoy",
year = "2006",
month = may,
day = "26",
language = "English",
series = "Human Capital",
type = "WorkingPaper",
}