Egypt is a country that has been characterised by a low and unequal educational attainment, although great progress has been made in later years. Previous studies on the return to education in the country, for salaried labour, have indicated that the country also has been characterised by relatively low returns. This thesis utilises the 1997 Egypt Integrated Household Survey and it finds that the picture of low returns remains if the analysis is broadened and refined along the lines indicated above. Several reasons for these low returns are discussed, e.g. quality problems with the school system and, for the self-employed in agriculture and the small-scale sector, a history of policy bias against them. It is also speculated that these results might have at least some relevance for the evolvement of attainment in Egypt.