A sustaining investment in vocational education and training have to be made for sustainable economic growth in a society. Efficiency and effectiveness of the investment in vocational education and training are major factors that determine the competitive power of a nation. Therefore, policy makers have to utilize various kind of information on efficiency and effectiveness of the investment in vocational education and training before it is made. Many researches have been made in this area in Korea. For example, 「A Comparative Study on Cost Effectiveness between Vocational Education and Vocational Training」was performed in 1998 at Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training, but this study, as in the other studies in this area, dealt with only cost side of the vocational education and training. To fill up the gap in previous studies, this study focuses on the benefit side of the vocational education and training. The specific objectives of this study are as follows:
1) To identify and define the concepts and types of investment in vocational education and training.
2) To analyze the effect of the investment in vocational education and training by calculating rate of return on investment.
3) To analyze cost structures of institutes for vocational education and training.
4) To investigate non-economic benefit of vocational education and training as well as economic benefit of it.
5) To derive implications to help related agents with making decisions.
This study was conducted through reviewing relevant literatures, surveying students in institutes for vocational education and training by using questionnaire. In addition, statistical and econometrical methods were used for calculating return of investment.
The results can be summarized as follows:
1) Average cost per student is the highest in technical college, and the lowest in technical high school among six different institutes for vocational education and training.
2) To compare with technical high school, average rate of return of investment per student is the highest in technical college, and the lowest in public vocational training institute.
3) This study used "satisfaction level" as an index of a non-economic benefit of investment in vocational education and training. The result shows that non-economic benefit is higher in vocational training institutes than vocational education institutes.
It is suggested that further studies will have to be carried out on the area of standardization of cost structure of vocational education and training institutes and measurement of non-economic benefit from vocational education and training.