Does Education or Underlying Human Capital Explain Liberal Economic Attitudes?
Abstract: There is a worldwide tendency for more educated people to trust in markets, private business, and trade, and to distrust government regulation and public provision relative to the less educated even in countries where people generally favor regulation (Aghion, et al. 2010). Individual survey data drawn from the Russian RMLS indicate that for Russia, as for most of the world, respondents with higher levels of education are more likely to trust private businesses, foreign banks, and privatization, to distrust government regulation, and to favor lesser provision of services by the State (vs. the private sector). This matches the macro survey findings of Aghion et al. (2010) for the transition economies and the work of Caplan (2001, 2002, 2007). However, it is not clear whether education is a causal factor in these preferences or whether education is proxying for different levels of cognitive ability, health or other forms of human capital. We use individual height data as instruments for education to remove the contemporaneous effects of schooling itself on the education trust link. We find that this IV estimation leaves us with clear and persistent links between education and market friendly attitudes in Russia. This human capital effect is also quite independent of the role of age in determining liberal attitudes and is not simply a cohort effect. This seems to conform to the worldwide observation that – whatever the independent changing institutions – greater health and cognitive ability seems to promote liberal beliefs in and of themselves.
