Cumulative Inequalities in Italian Higher Education. An analysis of data from the Italian Household Longitudinal Survey

Using data from the five waves of ILFI, the Italian Household Longitudinal Survey, this paper deals with the dynamics of higher education in the 20th century investigating how and how far cohort of birth and social class are associated with enrolment rate, drop-out rate, graduation behind schedule. Enrolment growth has not been followed by a proportional increase in graduation rates along the whole century. The drop-out rate has been high for decades, the amount of delayed graduations and the duration of the delay have been high too and have been increasing over time. As a consequence Italy is nowadays quite far from the other European countries in terms of tertiary education attainment. Moreover, in spite of the «1969 reform», there are still nowadays relevant inequalities in the rates of enrolment and graduation among different social categories. In particular, absolute social class inequalities tend not to diminish across cohorts. Upper classes not only have more opportunities than working classes to enter university and obtain a degree, they also have less chances of dropping-out, and graduating behind schedule. Results show cumulative advantages for higher classes, and cumulative disadvantages for lower classes.