In South Korea only 0.5% of GDP is spent by government on higher education, as opposed
to the 1% OECD average (Grubb et al. 2006: 15). As stated earlier, the fact that the higher
education system is dominated by private financing has important implications for economic
development because it is evident that the private component of the higher education
system is not producing sufficient numbers of high-quality graduates for the increasingly
sophisticated economy. The extent of private involvement in higher education is staggering.
For example, almost all of the 200 or so colleges are private; 145 out of 171 universities are
private (85%); and 75% of students are in private institutions