Well-intentioned plans to boost the brainpower of workforces by pushing more people into universities are now also looking flawed. Competence varied widely among individuals with similar qualifications, both within and across countries. Italy, Spain and America have large numbers of graduates, but still perform badly in literacy and numeracy tests. Even more worrying, some university degrees turn out not to offer much advantage over good secondary-school qualifications. Those who completed school in Japan and the Netherlands outperformed southern European graduates at the same age.

The lessons seem clear: vocational education needs to be both more consistent and more ambitious. But the bedrock of success is improving the quality of secondary education. Without that, letters after a name do not mean much.    The Jobs Problem