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Data from the 2021 census show that the share of people with higher education in Estonia is increasing and the share of people with basic education is decreasing. A fifth of the inhabitants in Estonia have a master's degree, and Tartu and Viimsi stand out for their particularly high concentration of highly educated people.

During the population and housing census, information on the highest level of education attained by inhabitants of Estonia was also gathered. Collected data revealed that the educational attainment of the population continues to rise. The level of education of foreigners living in here has also increased significantly. Below we will take a closer look at the educational attainment of the native Estonian- and Russian-speaking population as well as that of other mother tongue speakers and see how it has changed since the previous censuses.

According to Statistics Estonia, in 2019, the expenditures on research and development (R&D) in Estonia amounted to 453 million euros, which is 24% more than in 2018. The share of R&D expenditures in the gross domestic product was 1.61%, making it the highest share in the last five years.

Statistics Estonia's short-term labour market statistics show that over the past year and a half, there have been fewer young people aged 20–29 working in both the broader information and communication sector and the more specific field of computer programming. While in previous years the field of computer programming was growing mainly because of young people, in the past year their numbers have fallen.

According to the 2021 census, an estimated one third of the population have a long-term illness or health problem. This is 2 percentage points more than in the previous census in 2011. 28% of the population are limited in their daily activities because of a health problem.

According to Statistics Estonia, an estimated 80% of the population aged 20–64 participated in adult education in the previous year*. Participation in adult education is higher among women, younger age groups, people with higher educational attainment, and native speakers of Estonian. Self-development has become considerably more popular among 50–64-year-olds. At the same time, the results indicate that two out of five adults would have liked to study more.

According to Statistics Estonia, in 2018, the expenditure on research and development (R&D) in Estonia amounted to 365.6 million euros, which is a fifth more than in 2017.