Value generation and economic impact of the University of Granada

Abstract

Knowledge of the value generated within higher education institutions is of great interest for various agents, particularly managers, as well as governments and society. University mission statements and their scope complicate any comparable measurement of the effects each university may have within a particular region. Perhaps the most adequate term for it and one that includes simple economic impact is value. This study is centered on the estimation of the short-term economic impact of the University of Granada (UGR). Using a method based on the input–output framework and multipliers, the total (direct, indirect, and induced) effects of UGR on production, income, and employment are quantified, differentiating between economic sectors. The total economic impact of UGR is 3.2 times the expenditure of the agents linked to the activities of the university, which implies that each Euro that the government invested was converted into 7.1 Euros. Its effect on total production surpassed two-thousand million Euros, with an income of one-thousand million Euros and over 25,000 equivalent jobs. Quantification of the impact is a measure of the importance of UGR within the province of Granada and the performance of public-sector investment in higher education.