13
important for employment and wages.
40 percent of all 15-59 years old Danes with no formal education after mandatory school/high
school were in 1992 either unemployed (13%) or non active on the labour market (27%). For
all levels and types of education the shares were much lower. Only people with vocational
level education of service type or nursing type had more than 20 percent non-active or
unemployed. From 1980 to 1992 total unemployment increased with 116.000 persons, and the
number of non-active between 15 and 59 fell with 113.000 persons, cf. table 1 and 2. The same
tendencies are found for all types and levels of education: Registered unemployment rose and
the number of non-active (females) fell.
5. Education and trade: What is produced?
Trade is a mean and not an end. Countries export in order to generate income, that can be used
for imports of goods and services that are produced better or less expensive abroad (Krugman
1991). Domestic factors or production will be used for export only as long as factor
remuneration is not lower than in alternative production for domestic uses. As factors of
production is not equal distributed among countries and region, regions and countries tend to
specialize in products that require factors of production that are abundant. If consumption
(absorption) are equalized across regions they will export goods and services including
abundant factors and import goods and services which include scare factors.
This is formulated in Heckscher-Ohlin-Vanek model. The model is a mainstream of
international economics, and even though it often performs purely in empirical tests, it is
consistent with contemporary theory, or as Elhanan Helpman and Paul R. Krugman write in
the book: Market Structure and Foreign Trade. Increasing Returns, Imperfect Competition
and International Economy from 1985: The core of modern analysis of trade is the factor
proportions theory - the Heckscher-Ohlin model and its extensions ... Indeed, one of our main
purposes is to show that many of the insights gained from traditional theory continue to be
useful even in a world where increasing returns and imperfect competition are important.
The factor proportions theory rest on a set of usual assumptions from neo-classical economic