Abstract: The relationship between education and economic growth is a classic issue in the study of educational economics,but there is no consensus on how did the education contribute to economic growth nor on how to measure its contribution.As China is a dual economy featured with late-evolution and catching-up,it is difficult to explain the forty-year development of China with some certain theory of Western economics.To explore the relationship between education and economic growth requires a unified theoretical framework.By examining the neoclassical growth theory,the new economic growth theory,technology diffusion theory and Walt Whitman Rostow's and CAI Fang's economic development stage theories,this paper seeks for the internal logic of various theories and methods and their problems.By combining with the developing characteristics of China over the forty years of reform and opening-up,the paper analyzes the effecting mechanism of education on economic growth,and attempts to propose a framework for measuring the contributions of education to economic growth in line with the reality of China's economic and social developments.On the one hand,the analysis on the growth factors by phases,industries and sectors on the basis of the effecting mechanism of education reveals the contributions of education in improving the quality of labor force in the production process,increasing the entire social human capital and knowledge level,strengthening the technological innovation and the absorption of technology and promoting capital accumulation.On the other hand,the contribution of China's education to economic growth at various stages could be calculated by industries and sectors by the weighted method according to Theodore William Schultz's theory on investment and benefit.In addition,whether the selected educational indicators can substantially capture the educational characteristics of various development stages is also an important issue in measuring the contributions.The choice of human capital indicators should reflect the changes in the market's demand for different capabilities and skills in different periods.

Key words: educational economics, economic growth, human capital, effecting mechanism