Smart but Stuck: The Paradox of High Literacy in Russia (based on PIAAC old data)

Recently, I listened to a lecture on human capital in Russia, and many of the points reminded me of a paper I co-authored with a colleague some time ago, based on PIAAC data (if you're interested, here’s a link to the paper in Russian). The article was published way back in 2015, and the analysis was very basic, but as I recall, it even won some sort of award for “Innovative Approaches in Research.” Ironically, there were no real innovative approaches in it—unless you count the part where we were asked to remove the standard errors from our tables because they were “distracting.” 😊

Still, I’ve grown to like the study, even though I found some old notes showing that I was quite unhappy with it at the time. This just goes to show that sometimes, choosing the right question and angle is more important than using advanced methods—though of course, the methods matter too and could even change your conclusions.

So, I felt like sharing a bit about this paper, because despite its age, many of the insights are still relevant today.

A Brief Intro to PIAAC

PIAAC is often called “PISA for adults.” If that doesn’t help, here’s the idea: PIAAC measures functional literacy in adults—essentially, the ability to apply knowledge to solve real-life problems. Russia took part in the first round of PIAAC in 2011, which assessed literacy and numeracy.

Participants were assigned to one of five proficiency levels. One of the central hypotheses behind the project was that in modern societies, higher literacy levels are associated with greater socio-economic success—higher income, better education, and more prestigious jobs. In OECD countries, this hypothesis was confirmed. Those with low literacy (Level 1) were considered “at risk,” as they lacked the skills needed for full participation in social and economic life.

Note: These are not causal conclusions. It’s impossible to say whether literacy leads to success or the other way around—more education and higher income may lead to better literacy. Like most things in social science, the relationships are likely reciprocal.

In our article, we wanted to test whether these OECD patterns held true for Russia. Would Russians with high literacy levels enjoy the same advantages as their OECD counterparts? And how large would those advantages be?

!!!!!Spoiler: Russians with high functional literacy generally fare worse across many dimensions than equally literate individuals in OECD countries. Yes, there are differences between low- and high-literacy groups in Russia, but they’re much smaller than the differences observed in other countries.

Design

We focused on adults aged 26–60 (the working-age population) and divided them into two groups:

• Low literacy (Level 1 or below)

• High literacy (Levels 4 and 5 combined)

We then compared these two groups on a number of indicators:

1. Educational attainment

2. Participation in further education

3. Labor market position:

   • Whether they had paid work (either currently or in the past year)

   • Job skill level (for those employed)

   • Monthly income (in deciles)

4. Social inclusion indicators:

   • Trust in others and the government

   • Self-rated health

   • Job satisfaction

According to our draft materials, we also looked at:

• Demographic differences

• Employment sector (public/private/self-employed)

• Information-handling strategies

  
  

  Key Findings (Without the Stats Overload)

  
  

  Education

  Among high-literacy Russians, 75.8% had higher education—on par with the OECD average (75.6%). But among low-literacy Russians, 53.4% had higher education, compared to just 12.1% in the OECD. This probably says more about the quality of higher education in Russia than about inclusive educational policy.

  Below you can see the graph for several countries

  
  
  
  

  

  Proportion of respondents of PIAAC (2011) with higher education, by country

  Lifelong Learning

  
  

  In 2011, only 21% of Russians reported participating in further education, compared to 54.2% in the OECD.

  Among low-literacy individuals:

• Russia: 17.8% participated

• OECD: 32.5%

  
  

  Among high-literacy individuals:

• Russia: 26.1%

• OECD: 77.4%

  
  

  Russia had the lowest participation rate among high-literacy individuals in OECD countries.

  
  

  

  Proportion of respondents participating in formal and informal additional education

  Employment

  In Russia, 22% of working-age respondents had not had paid work in the previous year (OECD: 16%).Among high-literacy Russians this proportion was 17% (OECD: 6%) while among low-literacy respondents it was equal to 28% (OECD: 31%).

  
  

  We also looked at job types using PIAAC’s four occupational categories: 1) Skilled work (e.g., doctors, engineers, teachers); 2) Semi-skilled white collar (e.g., secretaries, sales managers); 3) Semi-skilled blue collar (e.g., mechanics, drivers); 4) Elementary jobs (e.g., cleaners, couriers).

  
  

  In Russia, high-literacy individuals were less likely to hold skilled jobs and more likely to be in semi-skilled blue-collar work than in the OECD. Meanwhile, low-literacy individuals were more likely to hold skilled positions than their OECD counterparts.

  
  

  

  Proportion of respondents with different types of jobs

  Other Findings

  • Only 14% of high-literacy Russians were satisfied with their jobs (vs. 29% in the OECD). Only Japan scored lower (7%).

  • 72% of high-literacy Russians agreed with the statement “If you’re not careful, people will take advantage of you,” compared to 48% in the OECD.

  Demographics

  • In Russia, 57% of high-literacy respondents were women (most OECD countries had more men, except Poland and the Nordic countries). It’s possible that by now these people have already left the labor market.

  • 15% of high-literacy Russians were aged 55–60 (OECD: 5%)

  • 31% were aged 26–34 (OECD average: 41%)

  
  

  Based on all the data, we came to the following conclusion:

  Compared to OECD countries, it is not so much Russians with low literacy who fall into the “at-risk zone,” but rather those with high scores on the tests. However, this does not indicate social exclusion in the usual sense, but rather a lag behind the most developed economies. Moreover, compared to OECD countries, highly literate individuals in Russia appear to be "deprived" across most of the indicators considered — including education and willingness to continue learning, employment and labor market position, earnings, job satisfaction, and self-reported health.

  And returning to the lecture I mentioned at the beginning.

  It was claimed there that the quality of human capital in Russia is low. But if we trust the PIAAC data, that’s not totally true. For example, the proportion of people with literacy levels 3 to 5 is quite high. Among the countries participating in the survey, this share was higher only in a few — such as Japan, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Australia. Meanwhile, in Russia, this proportion is actually higher than in the U.S., France, and many other countries. So, it seems it’s not just a question of whether such people exist, but rather what they are able to do in their own country. And that’s where the questions begin.

  We also published a second paper later comparing PIAAC and PISA data, and the findings were quite similar. To put it simply: Russia is not built for smart people.

  I do wonder what the results would look like if Russia had participated in another PIAAC round. The second wave is already available in open data. Maybe I’ll find the time to dig into it.