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on Education |
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Issue of 2012‒09‒22
nine papers chosen by Joao Carlos Correia Leitao University of Beira Interior and Technical University of Lisbon |
| By: | Facundo Albornoz; Antonio Cabrales; Esther Hauk |
| Abstract: | Immigration is an important problem in many societies, and it has wide-ranging effects on the educational systems of host countries. There is now a large empirical literature, but very little theoretical work on this topic. We introduce a model of family immigration in a framework where school quality and student outcomes are determined endogenously. This allows us to explain the selection of immigrants in terms of parental motivation and the policies which favor a positive selection. Also, we can study the effect of immigration on the school system and how school quality may self-reinforce immigrants’ and natives’ choices. |
| Keywords: | Education, Immigration, School resources, Parental involvement, Immigrant sorting |
| JEL: | I20 I21 I28 J24 J61 |
| Date: | 2012–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:werepe:we1203&r=edu |
| By: | Timothy J. Bartik (W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research); Marta Lachowska (W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research and Stockholm University) |
| Abstract: | In order to study whether college scholarships can be an effective tool in raising students’ performance in secondary school, we use one aspect of the Kalamazoo Promise that resembles a quasi-experiment. The surprise announcement of the scholarship created a large change in expected college tuition costs that varied across different groups of students based on past enrollment decisions. This variation is arguably exogenous to unobserved student characteristics. We estimate the effects of this change by a set of “difference-in-differences” regressions where we compare the change in student outcomes in secondary school across time for different student “length of enrollment” groups. We find positive effects of the Kalamazoo Promise on Promise-eligible students large enough to be deemed important—about a 9 percent increase in the probability of earning any credits and one less suspension day per year. We also find large increases in GPA among African American students. |
| Keywords: | Kalamazoo Promise, academic output, educational incentives, universal scholarship, natural experiment |
| JEL: | I21 I22 |
| Date: | 2012–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upj:weupjo:12-186&r=edu |
| By: | Madeeha Gohar Qureshi (Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad.) |
| Abstract: | In this study attempt has been made to link the gender differences in parental resource allocation in demand for education at primary, secondary and tertiary level of education to gender differences in returns to education in these respective categories in Pakistan. The hypothesis was that if we find that labour market rewards male more than female then this may be able to give a plausible explanation of why households invest much less in daughter’s education. However our results suggest otherwise that there is under investment in females education at all levels even though returns to education are much higher for females than males. One possible explanation could be that even though private rate of return to time spent in school than in labour market is higher for a female compared to male but the part of return that goes to parents are much lower for daughters than sons in Pakistan due to dependence of parents on their son for old age support. The key factor from policy point of view that can reduce such discriminatory attitude towards female enrolment in a household are found to be education of parents especially mother’s education. Both father’s and mother’s education are found to have significant positive impact on education of both sons and daughters. However mother’s education compared to father has much more impact in terms of magnitude at all levels of education and especially the role is more pronounced for daughters. |
| Keywords: | Enrolment Rates, Rates of Return, Gender, Pakistan |
| JEL: | I21 J16 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pid:wpaper:2012:84&r=edu |
| By: | Frank M. Fossen; Tobias J.M. Büttner |
| Abstract: | We assess the relevance of formal education for the productivity of the self-employed and distinguish between opportunity entrepreneurs, who voluntarily pursue a business opportunity, and necessity entrepreneurs, who lack alternative employment options. We expect differences in the returns to education between these groups because of different levels of control. We use the German Socio-economic Panel and account for the endogeneity of education and non-random selection. The results indicate that the returns to a year of education for opportunity entrepreneurs are 3.5 percentage points higher than the paid employees’ rate of 8.1%, but 6.5 percentage points lower for necessity entrepreneurs. |
| Keywords: | returns to education, opportunity, necessity, entrepreneurship |
| JEL: | J23 J24 J31 I20 L26 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp482&r=edu |
| By: | Dur, Umut |
| Abstract: | Abstract This paper characterizes the top trading cycles mechanism for the school choice problem. Schools may have multiple available seats to be assigned to students. For each school a strict priority ordering of students is determined by the school district. Each student has strict preference over the schools. We first define weaker forms of fairness, consistency and resource monotonicity. We show that the top trading cycles mechanism is the unique Pareto efficient and strategy-proof mechanism that satisfies the weaker forms of fairness, consistency and resource monotonicity. To our knowledge this is the first axiomatic approach to the top trading cycles mechanism in the school choice problem where schools have a capacity greater than one. |
| Keywords: | Top Trading Cycles Mechanism; School Choice Problem |
| JEL: | C78 I20 D78 D61 |
| Date: | 2012–09–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:41366&r=edu |
| By: | Jeffrey R. Brown; Stephen G. Dimmock; Scott Weisbenner |
| Abstract: | Charitable donations are an important revenue source for many institutions of higher education. We explore how donations respond to economic and financial market shocks, accounting for both supply and demand channels through which these shocks operate. In panel data with fixed effects to control for unobservable differences across universities, we find that overall donations to higher education – and especially capital donations for university endowments or for buildings– are positively and significantly correlated with the average income and house values in the state where the university is located (supply effects). We also find that when a university suffers a negative endowment shock that is large relative to its operating budget, donations increase (demand effects). This is especially true for donations earmarked for current use. We conclude by discussing the importance of understanding how donations respond to economic shocks for effective financial risk management by colleges and universities. |
| JEL: | H41 I2 I22 I23 |
| Date: | 2012–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:18389&r=edu |
| By: | Franciscos Koutentakis (University of Crete) |
| Abstract: | The paper introduces public education fi��nanced by linear taxation into a standard model of persistent inequality. It obtains the straightforward conclusion that agents with income above the average will prefer a positive tax rate. This implies a majority of agents supporting the introduction of public education suggesting that democracy is necessary and sufficient condition for redistribution. |
| Keywords: | Public education, persistent inequality, democracy |
| JEL: | H4 |
| Date: | 2012–07–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crt:wpaper:1204&r=edu |
| By: | Katja Görlitz; Marcus Tamm |
| Abstract: | This paper addresses the question to which extent the complementarity between education and training can be attributed to differences in observable characteristics, i.e. to individual, job and firm specific characteristics. The novelty of this paper is to analyze previously unconsidered characteristics, in particular, personality traits and tasks performed at work which are taken into account in addition to the standard individual specific determinants. Results show that tasks performed at work are strong predictors of training participation while personality traits are not. Once working tasks and other job related characteristics are controlled for, the skill gap in training participation drops considerably for off-the-job training and vanishes for on-the-job training. |
| Keywords: | Training, personality traits, working tasks, Oaxaca decomposition |
| JEL: | I21 J24 |
| Date: | 2012 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp477&r=edu |
| By: | Espinosa, Miguel; Rondon, Carlos; Romero, Mauricio |
| Abstract: | There has been so much debate on the increasing use of formal mathematical methods in Economics. Although there are some studies tackling these issues, those use either a little amount of papers, a small amount of scholars or cover a short period of time. We try to overcome these challenges constructing a database characterizing the main socio demographic and academic output of a survey of 438 scholars divided into three groups: Economics Nobel Prize winners; scholars awarded with at least one of six prestigious recognitions in Economics; and academic faculty randomly selected from the top twenty Economics departments worldwide. Our results provide concrete measures of mathematization in Economics by giving statistical evidence on the increasing trend of number of equations and econometric outputs per article. We also show that for each of these variables there have been four structural breaks and three of them have been increasing ones. Furthermore, we found that the training and use of mathematics has a positive correlation with the probability of winning a Nobel Prize in certain cases. It also appears that being an empirical researcher as measured by the average number of econometrics outputs per paper has a negative correlation with someone's academic career success. |
| Keywords: | Nobel Prize, Mathematics, Economics, Reputation |
| JEL: | N01 B3 C14 C81 |
| Date: | 2012–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:41341&r=edu |