Sir,
I was intrigued to read the two articles on universities in the Netherlands (RES Newsletter July 2012). Fellow members may be interested to know the results of a comparison exercise I undertook a couple of years ago of real resources per student in Higher Education in a number of developed countries. This used specific parities for educational expenditure to compare expenditure per student.
I found that in 2002 the Netherlands spent roughly a quarter more than the United Kingdom and more than half as much again as Germany. See Journal of US-China Public Administration, January 2011, p.102 ‘Table 9: Expenditure per Student on Tertiary Education 2002: Three Alternative Volume Measures’. (All figures in OECD dollars).
Such results are consistent with the anecdotal evidence reported by Professor Arnold.
Yours sincerely,
Donald Roy