As sources of legitimation for the assignment of social status, education and training systems are more strongly rooted in particular national traditions than other social institutions. Most typologies of national skill systems focus on the differences in general and vocational education in upper secondary school. However, with increasing investment in preschool education, the expansion of university education and the growing importance of education and training for adults, comparative researchers are paying increasing attention to the education and training system as a whole, with the result that country typologies are necessarily becoming more complex. The chapter shows that we must bid farewell to the myth that the sole objective of education and training reforms is to increase economic efficiency. In modern democracies, reforms of education and training systems are often characterised by conflicts between the protection of status, on the one hand, and increasing equality, on the other.