Changes in population structure and social demand for higher education in Iran

In recent decades, skilled and professional human resources are key elements of production as well as economic development. Since, institutions of higher education in each country are among the main gateways of labor market, Human capital formation requires improvement and investment in higher education as central part of the human capital production. Hence, development of higher education in a country can plan accelerate of business succeeds and economic development through highly trained and skilled. In the decades after revolution of Iran, Higher education has been encountered (experienced) different challenges. One of these challenges is the social demand for higher education that is closely associated to changes in population structure. The main goal of this paper is to find out how the demographic transitions affect social demand for higher education in the post-revolution period.
In order to reach this goal, first, we studied the changes in social demand for higher education based on information of the national education assessment in 1983-2012, then the impact of demographic changes on development of higher education demand was investigated. After that, using the demographic projections of future changes in the social demand for higher education was explored in terms of demography.