TERTIARY EDUCATION AND REGIONAL ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS IN THE SOUTH-WEST OLTENIA REGION (2000–2023)

This paper examines the relationship between tertiary education outcomes and regional economic performance in the South-West Oltenia Development Region of Romania over the extended period 2000–2023. The study uses official longitudinal data collected from two authoritative statistical sources. Data on higher education graduates (ISCED 5–8), disaggregated by year, were obtained from the National Institute of Statistics (INS) via the Tempo Online database. Regional GDP per capita (expressed in euro per inhabitant) was extracted from Eurostat, using the NUTS 2 dataset corresponding to RO41 – South-West Oltenia. These datasets provide a consistent and comparable empirical foundation for examining long-term developments in human capital and economic growth. The quantitative analysis will be performed using IBM SPSS Statistics, applying a set of statistical techniques appropriate for long-term regional data. The methodological approach focuses on identifying patterns, associations, and potential relationships between the evolution of tertiary education outputs and regional economic performance indicators. By adopting a structured empirical framework, the study aims to capture both the directional tendencies and the magnitude of the links between human capital formation and GDP per capita dynamics across more than two decades. By integrating two high-quality official data sources and a 24-year observation period, the research offers a comprehensive examination of how tertiary education contributes to regional development trajectories in South-West Oltenia. The findings are expected to enrich the academic debate on the role of education, human capital, and regional economic disparities.