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on Education |
|
Issue of 2007‒07‒20
four papers chosen by Joao Carlos Correia Leitao University of the Beira Interior |
| By: | Janet Currie; Eric Hanushek; E. Megan Kahn; Matthew Neidell; Steven Rivkin |
| Abstract: | We examine the effect of air pollution on school absences using unique administrative data for elementary and middle school children in the 39 largest school districts in Texas. These data are merged with information from monitors maintained by the Environmental Protection Agency. To control for potentially confounding factors, we adopt a difference-in-difference-in differences strategy, and control for persistent characteristics of schools, years, and attendance periods in order to focus on variations in pollution within school-year-attendance period cells. We find that high levels of carbon monoxide (CO) significantly increase absences, even when they are below federal air quality standards. |
| JEL: | I18 Q51 |
| Date: | 2007–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13252&r=edu |
| By: | Sullivan, Paul |
| Abstract: | This paper examines career choices using a dynamic structural model that nests a job search model within a human capital model of occupational and educational choices. Individuals in the model decide when to attend school and when to move between firms and occupations over the course of their career. Workers search for suitable wage and non-pecuniary match values at firms across occupations given their heterogeneous skill endowments and preferences for employment in each occupation. Over the course of their careers workers endogenously accumulate firm and occupation specific human capital that affects wages differently across occupations. The parameters of the model are estimated with simulated maximum likelihood using data from the 1979 cohort of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. The structural parameter estimates reveal that both self-selection in occupational choices and mobility between firms account for a much larger share of total earnings and utility than the combined effects of firm and occupation specific human capital. Eliminating the gains from matching between workers and occupations would reduce total wages by 31%, eliminating the gains from job search would reduce wages by 19%, and eliminating the effects of firm and occupation specific human capital on wages would reduce wages by only 2.8%. |
| Keywords: | occupational choice; job search; human capital; dynamic programming models |
| JEL: | J24 J62 I21 |
| Date: | 2006–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:3896&r=edu |
| By: | Mike Misek |
| Date: | 2007–06–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwneu:neurusp108&r=edu |
| By: | Valadkhani, Abbas (University of Wollongong); Ville, Simon (University of Wollongong) |
| Abstract: | This paper develops and estimates a cross-sectional model for forecasting research output across the Australian university system. It builds upon an existing literature that focuses either on institutional comparisons or studies of specific subjects, by providing discipline-specific results across all of the ten major disciplinary areas as defined by AustraliaâÃÂÃÂs Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST). The model draws upon four discipline-specific explanatory variables; staff size, research expenditure, PhD completions, and student-staff ratios to predict output of refereed articles. When compared with actual averaged output for 2000-2004, the results are highly statistically significant. |
| Date: | 2006 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uow:depec1:wp06-26&r=edu |