|
on Education |
|
Issue of 2016‒07‒09
thirty-one papers chosen by João Carlos Correia Leitão Universidade da Beira Interior |
| By: | Woessmann, Ludger (Ifo Institute for Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | Students in some countries do far better on international achievement tests than students in other countries. Is this all due to differences in what students bring with them to school – socio-economic background, cultural factors, and the like? Or do school systems make a difference? This essay argues that differences in features of countries' school systems, and in particular their institutional structures, account for a substantial part of the cross-country variation in student achievement. It first documents the size and cross-test consistency of international differences in student achievement. Next, it uses the framework of an education production function to provide descriptive analysis of the extent to which different factors of the school system, as well as factors beyond the school system, account for cross-country achievement differences. Finally, it covers research that goes beyond descriptive associations by addressing leading concerns of bias in cross-country analysis. The available evidence suggests that differences in expenditures and class size play a limited role in explaining cross-country achievement differences, but that differences in teacher quality and instruction time do matter. This suggests that what matters is not so much the amount of inputs that school systems are endowed with, but rather how they use them. Correspondingly, international differences in institutional structures of school systems such as external exams, school autonomy, private competition, and tracking have been found to be important sources of international differences in student achievement. |
| Keywords: | student achievement, international comparison, education production function, schools, education, institutions, external exams, autonomy, competition, private schools, tracking, educational expenditure, teachers, instruction time, TIMSS, PISA |
| JEL: | I21 H52 L38 J24 D02 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10001&r=edu |
| By: | Holford, Angus J. (University of Essex) |
| Abstract: | We identify the effects of part-time employment, study time at home, and attitudes in school, in the production function for educational performance among UK teenagers in compulsory education. Our approach identifies the factors driving differences between the reduced form 'policy effect' of in-school employment, and its direct effect or 'production function parameter'. Part-time employment is shown to reduce performance among girls but not boys, because employment crowds out both study time at home and positive attitude in school to a greater extent for girls than boys. Part-time work also induces earlier initiation into risky behaviours for girls than boys. |
| Keywords: | labour supply, human capital, education production function, child development |
| JEL: | C35 I21 J22 J24 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10009&r=edu |
| By: | Avitabile, Ciro; Bobba, Matteo; Pariguana, Marco |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the role of liquidity constraints in shaping curricular choices in upper secondary education. In the context of the centralized school assignment sys- tem in Mexico City, we study how a large household income shock affects sorting of relatively disadvantaged youth over high school tracks exploiting the discontinuity in the assignment of the welfare program, Oportunidades. The in-cash transfer is found to significantly increase the probability of selecting the vocational track as the most preferred option vis-a-vis other more academically-oriented education modalities. The observed change in stated preferences affects admission outcomes within the school assignment system, thereby suggesting the scope for longer term impacts on schooling and labor market trajectories. |
| Keywords: | school choice, tracking, financial constraints, vocational education, returns to education, regression discontinuity design. |
| JEL: | D83 I21 I24 J24 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:30495&r=edu |
| By: | Fan Li; Prashant Loyalka; Hongmei Yi; Yaojiang Shi; Natalie Johnson; Scott Rozelle |
| Abstract: | The goal of this paper is describe and analyze the relationship between ability tracking and student social capital, in the context of poor students in developing countries. Drawing on the results from a longitudinal study among 1,436 poor students across 132 schools in rural China, we find a significant lack of interpersonal trust and confidence in public institutions among poor rural young adults. We also find that there is a strong correlation between ability tracking during junior high school and levels of social capital. The disparities might serve to further widen the gap between the relatively privileged students who are staying in school and the less privileged students who are dropping out of school. This result suggests that making high school accessible to more students would improve social capital in the general population. |
| Keywords: | ability tracking, social capital, interpersonal trust, confidence in public institutions, rural secondary schooling |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ete:licosp:544339&r=edu |
| By: | India Hemanshu Kumar; Rohini Somanathan2 |
| Abstract: | Research on caste-based inequalities in India has generally focused on differences between large categories such as the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes, and the remainder of the population. We contribute to the literature on horizontal inequalities in India by looking within these groupings, and studying differences between the individual jatis that comprise these categories. Using census data, we find evidence of persistent inequalities in educational outcomes between the jatis, suggesting that socio-economic hierarchies have proved to be stable throughout the post-Independence period. Indeed, the evidence points to divergence: communities with more education in 1961 also had higher educational attainment in 2001. Also, while numerically larger Scheduled Caste communities witnessed greater improvements in educational levels compared to smaller ones, this was not true for the Scheduled Tribes. This may be the result of their greater political mobilization. Keywords: caste, tribe, India, disadvantaged groups, horizontal inequalities, affirmative action, education |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp2016-085&r=edu |
| By: | Enriqueta Camps; Stanley Engerman |
| Abstract: | In this paper we present results for educational achievement in the different economic regions of Latin America (Big countries: Mexico and Brazil; Southern Cone; Andean countries; Central America; and others) during the twentieth century. The variables we use to measure education are average years of education, literacy, average years in primary school, average years in secondary school, and average years in university. To attain a broader perspective on the relationship of education with human capital and with welfare and wellbeing we relate the educational measures to life expectancy and other human capital variables and GDP per capita. We then use regressions to examine the impact of race and ethnicity on education, and of education on economic growth and levels of GDP per capita. The most significant results we wish to emphasize are related to the importance of race and racial fractionalization in explaining regional differences in educational achievement. Southern Cone countries, with a higher density of white population, present the highest levels of education in average terms, while countries from Central America and Brazil, with a higher proportion of Indigenous Americans and/or blacks, have the lowest levels. In most countries the major improvements in educational achievement are: the expansion of primary education during the first half of the twentieth century, and the expansion of secondary education after 1950. In all cases, average years in university are low, despite improvements in university quality during the last decades of the century when professors exiled during dictatorships returned to their countries of origin. International comparisons (continental averages for years of education weighted by country population size) place twentieth-century Latin America in an intermediate position between the USA and Europe at the top, and countries from Asia and Africa at the bottom. |
| Keywords: | LA, regional educational achievement, welfare, race and ethnicity, economic growth. |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upf:upfgen:1528&r=edu |
| By: | Matthew Johnson; Alicia Demers; Cleo Jacobs Johnson; Claudia Gentile |
| Abstract: | The Kauffman School is a charter school in Kansas City, Missouri that serves students from the city’s most economically disadvantaged neighborhoods. This report evaluates the effectiveness of the school at improving student achievement during its first four years of operation. |
| Keywords: | charter school evaluation, school effectiveness |
| JEL: | I |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:5175e15711054006b860f263e4d8d313&r=edu |
| By: | Yusuke Jinnai (International Univeristy of Japan) |
| Abstract: | Teacher performance pay programs form the foundation of recent reforms in public education. Although existing research has found monetary bonuses for teachers increase student achievement, no studies have examined the potentially negative effects of repealing such incentives. Using novel data from North Carolina, where the state government first reduced and finally repealed its teacher incentive program, this paper shows that student achievement at the lowest-performing schools significantly decreased after the reduction in bonuses and further decreased after the repeal of the incentive program. These findings illustrate that once incentives are introduced it is not cost-free to reduce or remove them. |
| Keywords: | School accountability, Performance pay, Teacher incentives |
| JEL: | I21 H4 |
| Date: | 2016–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iuj:wpaper:ems_2016_08&r=edu |
| By: | Aysit Tansel (Department of Economics, Middle East Technical University, IZA Bonn, and ERF Cairo); Deniz Karaoglan (Department of Economics, Middle East Technical University) |
| Abstract: | This study provides causal effect of education on health behaviors in Turkey which is a middle income developing country. Health Survey of the Turkish Statistical Institute for the years 2008, 2010 and 2012 are used. The health behaviors considered are smoking, alcohol consumption, fruit and vegetable consumption, exercising and one health outcome namely, the body mass index (BMI). We examine the causal effect of education on these health behaviors and the BMI Instrumental variable approach is used in order to address the endogeneity of education to health behaviors. Educational expansion of the early 1960s is used as the source of exogenous variation in years of schooling. Our main findings are as follows. Education does not significantly affect the probability of smoking or exercising. The higher the education level the higher the probability of alcohol consumption and the probability of fruit and vegetable consumption. Higher levels of education lead to higher BMI levels. This study provides a baseline for further research on the various aspects of health behaviors in Turkey. |
| Keywords: | Turkey, Health Behaviors, Education, Instrumental Variable Estimation |
| JEL: | I10 I12 I19 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koc:wpaper:1606&r=edu |
| By: | Perez-Arce, Francisco; Marquez-Padilla, Fernanda; Rodriguez-Castelan, Carlos |
| Abstract: | There is a growing interest in economic literature on the pervasive effects of violence exposure on human capital accumulation. However, this literature has come short on disentangling the direct effects of violence on individuals' schooling decisions from the indirect effects related to the destruction of infrastructure which inevitably accompanies armed conflict. In this paper we study the sharp increase in violence experienced in Mexico after 2006, known as "The War on Drugs" and its effects on human capital accumulation. This upsurge in violence is expected to have direct effects on individuals' schooling decisions but not indirect effects as severe destruction of infrastructure was absent. In addition, the fact that the marked increases in violence were concentrated in some municipalities (and not in others) allows us to implement a fixed effects methodology to study the effects of violence on education outcomes. Differently to several recent studies that have found significant negative effects of violence on economic outcomes in Mexico, we find evidence that this is not the case, at least in terms of human capital accumulation. By using several sources of data we show that at most very small effects on total enrollment exist. We also show that these small effects on enrollment may be driven by some students being displaced from high violence municipalities to low violence municipalities; but the education decisions of individuals do not seem to be highly impacted. We also discard the possibility that the effects on enrollment of young adults appear small due to a counteracting effect from ex-workers returning to school (i.e. we discard the possibility that crime reduced labor force participation, and those affected enrolled in school). These results stand in contrast with recent evidence of the negative effects of crime on short-term economic growth since minimal to null effects of violence on human capital accumulation today should have little to none adverse effects on long-term growth outcomes in Mexico. |
| Keywords: | crime, education, fixed effects, Mexico |
| JEL: | C23 D74 H75 I21 O54 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ran:wpaper:1082&r=edu |
| By: | Lusher, Lester (University of California, Davis); Yasenov, Vasil (University of California, Davis) |
| Abstract: | Sleep studies suggest that girls go to sleep earlier, are more active in the morning, and cope with sleep deprivation better than boys. We provide the first causal evidence on how gender differences in sleep cycles can help explain the gender performance gap. We exploit over 240,000 assignment-level grades from a quasi-experiment with a community of middle and high schools where students' schedules alternated between morning and afternoon start times each month. Relative to girls, we find that boys' achievement benefits from a later start time. For classes taught at the beginning of the school day, our estimates explain up to 16% of the gender performance gap. |
| Keywords: | gender performance gap, gender difference in sleep cycles, school start time |
| JEL: | H52 I20 I21 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10012&r=edu |
| By: | Aithal, Sreeramana; Shenoy, Varun |
| Abstract: | The success of higher education is measured in olden days by determining the level of knowledge and skills the students gained during that period. But as time progress, the phenomena of globalization and large quantity of job creation in Information Technology industries changed the scenario in such a way that new model of higher education is seen which consists of providing campus placement as a final part of their higher education service. Recently, providing campus placement to successful students is considered as institutional obligation and institutions are ranked based on number of successful job placement provided in the campus for a given year along with the average salary offered. But as time progress, the model of campus placement is going to change and it is predicted that industries are thinking of adopting new model of placement through online. In this new model called “Online-oriented industry placement model”, students have to study various companies of their choice in different countries, and study their business models along with suggesting solutions to their problems and business expansion opportunities with students/applicants promise of individual contribution to the company. If company executives realise that the candidate is suitable for their organization they may offer competitive job but sustainability is a function of candidate’s contribution to organizational challenge and his individual continuation to group productivity. The paper contains the details on this new proposed model and strategy to be followed by the student to get good challenging job offers from reputed international companies and hard and smart work he/she has to perform for his/her sustainability and growth in the organization. The paper also contains advantages, benefits, constraints, and disadvantages of such online student centric placement model. |
| Keywords: | Future campus placement model, Online-oriented industry placement model. |
| JEL: | I2 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:72245&r=edu |
| By: | Tansel, Aysit (Middle East Technical University); Karaoğlan, Deniz (Middle East Technical University) |
| Abstract: | This study provides causal effect of education on health behaviors in Turkey which is a middle income developing country. Health Survey of the Turkish Statistical Institute for the years 2008, 2010 and 2012 are used. The health behaviors considered are smoking, alcohol consumption, fruit and vegetable consumption, exercising and one health outcome namely, the body mass index (BMI). We examine the causal effect of education on these health behaviors and the BMI Instrumental variable approach is used in order to address the endogeneity of education to health behaviors. Educational expansion of the early 1960s is used as the source of exogenous variation in years of schooling. Our main findings are as follows. Education does not significantly affect the probability of smoking or exercising. The higher the education level the higher the probability of alcohol consumption and the probability of fruit and vegetable consumption. Higher levels of education lead to higher BMI levels. This study provides a baseline for further research on the various aspects of health behaviors in Turkey. |
| Keywords: | Turkey, health behaviors, education, instrumental variable estimation |
| JEL: | I10 I12 I19 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10020&r=edu |
| By: | Aithal, Sreeramana |
| Abstract: | Vision, mission, objectives and core values play major role in setting up sustainable organizations. Vision and mission statements describe the organization’s goals. Core values and core principles represent the organization’s culture. In this paper, we have discussed a model on how a higher education institution can prosper to reach its goal of ‘creating innovators’ through its vision, mission, objectives and core values. A model for the core values required for a prospective graduate from higher educational institutions is developed, discussed and analysed. The model identifies some of the core values which are essential for a student/graduate to become successful and stand-out in his/her life. Based on the core values, a set of core principles for higher educational institutions is developed. Finally, the benefits of core values and core principles are discussed. |
| Keywords: | Organizational Vision, Organizational mission, Organizational core values, Creating innovators. |
| JEL: | O31 O35 |
| Date: | 2016–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:71954&r=edu |
| By: | Jepsen, Christopher (University College Dublin); Mueser, Peter R. (University of Missouri-Columbia); Jeon, Kyung-Seong (University of Missouri-Columbia) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides novel evidence on the labor-market returns to proprietary (also called for-profit) postsecondary school attendance. Specifically, we link administrative records on proprietary school attendance with quarterly earnings data for nearly 70,000 students. Because average age at school entry is 30 years of age, and because we have earnings data for five or more years prior to attendance, we estimate a person fixed-effects model to control for time-invariant differences across individuals. By five years after entry, quarterly earnings returns are around 26 percent for men and 21-22 percent for women. Average returns are quite similar for associate's degree programs and certificate programs, but vary substantially by field of study. Differences in return by gender are completely explained by differences in field of study. |
| Keywords: | postsecondary education, labor-market returns, proprietary schooling |
| JEL: | J24 I26 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10007&r=edu |
| By: | Maurice Schiff |
| Abstract: | Immigrants or their children founded over 40% of the Fortune 500 US companies. This suggests that ‘ability drain’ is economically significant. While brain drain associated with migration also induces a brain gain, this cannot occur with ability drain. This paper examines migration’s impact on ability, education, and productive human capital or ‘skill’ (which includes both ability and education) for source country residents and migrants, under three different regimes: (i) a points system that accounts for educational attainment; (ii) a ‘vetting’ system that accounts for both ability and education or skill (e.g., the US H1-B visa program); and (iii) a points system that combines the points and vetting systems (as in Canada since 2015). It finds that migration reduces (raises) source country residents’ (migrants’) average ability and has an ambiguous (positive) impact on their average education and skill, with a net skill drain more likely than a net brain drain. These effects increase the more unequal is ability, i.e., the higher the variance in ability. The average ability drain for highly educated US immigrants from 42 developing source countries is 84 percent of the brain drain, a ratio that increases with source countries’ income and is greater than one for most Latin American and Caribbean countries. Heterogeneity in ability is the ultimate cause of both ability and brain drain (as they are equal to zero under homogeneous ability). Policy implications are provided. |
| Keywords: | Migration, points system, vetting system, ability drain, brain drain |
| JEL: | F22 J24 J61 O15 |
| Date: | 2016–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rsc:rsceui:2016/22&r=edu |
| By: | Aithal, Sreeramana |
| Abstract: | Institutional Ranking in higher educational institutions became common practice and business schools are highly benefitted by the announced worldwide ranks based on various ranking criterions. The ranking is usually announced based on pedagogy, placement, research output, faculty-student ratio, international linkage, management of technology etc. We have developed a model of calculating research productivity of higher educational institution based on calculating institutional research index and weighted research index. The institutional research productivity is calculated using a metric which consists of three institutional variables and one parameter. The three variables identified as the number of Articles published in peer reviewed journals (A), the number of Books published (B), and number of Case studies and/or Book Chapters (C) published during a given time of observation. The parameter used is the number of full-time Faculty members (F) in that higher education institution which remains constant during a given period of observation. In this paper, we have used ABC model of institutional research productivity to calculate annual research productivity of some of the world top business schools. The annual publication data for the year 2015 is collected from the respective institutional websites. The research productivity of these institutions are determined and compared. Based on research productivity index, and corrected research productivity index, the Business Schools are re-ranked. The parameters used in Financial Times (FT) Ranking system is compared with the features of ABC research productivity ranking model. |
| Keywords: | Business school ranking, Faculty productivity, Institutional productivity, Institutional publication index. |
| JEL: | I21 |
| Date: | 2016–06–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:72246&r=edu |
| By: | Aithal, Sreeramana; Kumar, Suresh |
| Abstract: | Institutional Ranking has become a common practice in higher educational institutions, and business schools are the most benefitted by such ranking announced worldwide based on various ranking criteria. The ranking is usually based on pedagogy, placement, research output, faculty-student ratio, international linkage, management of technology etc. In this paper, based on six postulates, we have argued and analysed why the performance of higher educational institutions should be based on sole criteria of Institutional Research Performance (IRP). We have developed a model of measuring research productivity for higher educational institutions based on calculating institutional research index and weighted research index. The institutional research productivity is calculated using a metric which consists of three institutional variables and one parameter. The three variables identified are the following : Number of Articles published in peer reviewed journals (A), Number of Books published (B), and Number of Case studies and/or Book Chapters (C) published during a given time of observation. The parameter used is a number of full-time Faculty members (F) which remains constant during a given period of observation. A framework for institutional ranking based on institutional research productivity by considering calculated Institutional Research Index is also developed which can be used to give grades to higher educational institutions. Further, the model is tested by making use of case example of two best Business Schools from the USA and two best Business Schools from India. The value of research index and weighted research index are calculated for these institutions and observed variation of research productivity during last four years is also studied and discussed. |
| Keywords: | Business school ranking, Faculty productivity, Institutional research productivity, Institutional research productivity index. |
| JEL: | I23 |
| Date: | 2016–06–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:72333&r=edu |
| By: | Anita K Zonebia (Department of Economics, Padjadjaran University); Arief Anshory Yusuf (Department of Economics, Padjadjaran University); Heriyaldi (Department of Economics, Padjadjaran University) |
| Abstract: | Level of economic development has been found to be among the strongest determinants of corruption level in cross-country studies. Those studies use income per capita as a measure of level of development and found that higher level of corruption is associated with lower level of income. We argue that, at any given income level, education is also a very important determinant of the level of corruption and failing to include education may bias or over-estimate the importance of income. We estimated an empirical model of individual’s attitude toward anti-corruption using a large sample of 9,020 individuals that represent Indonesian population and find that the effect of income (proxied by expenditure) is either weakened or eliminated when we control for the level of education. The effect of education is also found to exhibit a non-linear pattern which implies that investing in education will have increasing returns in the form of anti-corruption attitude. This finding supports the view that increasing access to education is an effective measure of reducing corruption norms particularly in developing countries. |
| Keywords: | Corruption, Anti-corruption, development, Indonesia |
| JEL: | D73 |
| Date: | 2015–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unp:sdgspp:201615&r=edu |
| By: | Ira Nichols-Barrer; Caroline Lauver; Leigh Linden; Matt Sloan |
| Keywords: | Georgia Improving General Education Quality , School Rehabilitation Activity, international |
| JEL: | F Z |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:9e2e80ced10c4e2dbdefac02c4f4d69d&r=edu |
| By: | Torun, Huzeyfe (Central Bank of Turkey); Tumen, Semih (Central Bank of Turkey) |
| Abstract: | Based on a law enacted in November 1999, males born on or before December 31st 1972 are given the option to benefit from a paid exemption from compulsory military service in Turkey. Exploiting this natural experiment, we devise an empirical strategy to estimate the intention-to-treat effect of this paid exemption on education and labor market outcomes of the individuals in the target group. We find that the paid exemption reform reduces the years of schooling among males who are eligible to benefit from the reform relative to the ineligible males. In particular, the probability of receiving a college degree or above falls among the eligible males. The result is robust to alternative estimation strategies. We find no reduction in education when we implement the same exercises with (i) data on females and (ii) placebo reform dates. The interpretation is that the reform has reduced the incentives to continue education for the purpose of deferring military service. We also find suggestive evidence that the paid exemption reform reduces the labor income for males in the target group. The reduction in earnings is likely due to the reduction in education. It should be noted, however, that due to the characteristics of the population on the treatment margin, the external validity of these results should be assessed cautiously. |
| Keywords: | compulsory military service, draft avoidance, intention to treat, education, earnings |
| JEL: | C21 I21 I26 J21 J31 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10004&r=edu |
| By: | Moira McCullough; Stephen Lipscomb; Hanley Chiang; Brian Gill |
| Abstract: | We examined Pennsylvania’s Framework for Leadership (FFL), a tool for measuring and evaluating principals’ professional practices. Using data on more than 300 principals, we find that FFL evaluation scores are significantly and positively correlated with estimates of principals’ contributions to student achievement. This is the first study to find evidence that ratings of principals’ professional practice are correlated with credible measures of principals’ contributions to student achievement. |
| Keywords: | principal evaluation, educator effectiveness, principal value-added |
| JEL: | I |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:23864abe140c4b658d1ba88d49f8494a&r=edu |
| By: | Barrett, Garry (University of Sydney); Riddell, W. Craig (University of British Columbia, Vancouver) |
| Abstract: | We study the relationship between age and literacy skills using data from the IALS, ALL and PIAAC surveys. In cross-sectional data there is a negative partial relationship between literacy skills and age that is statistically significant indicating that literacy declines with age, especially after age 45. However, this relationship could reflect some combination of age and birth cohort effects. In order to isolate age effects, we use the three international surveys to create synthetic cohorts. Our analysis shows that in most participating OECD countries the negative slope of the literacy-age profile in cross-sectional data arises from offsetting ageing and cohort effects. In these countries more recent birth cohorts have lower levels of literacy and individuals from a given birth cohort lose literacy skills after they leave school at a rate greater than indicated by cross-sectional estimates. Finland, Italy and the Netherlands are exceptions to this pattern; in these countries more recent cohorts have higher literacy levels and the cross-sectional estimates overstate the rate at which literacy declines with age. Our birth cohort results suggest that there is not a general tendency for literacy skills to decline from one generation to the next, but that the majority of the countries examined are doing a poorer job of developing literacy skills in successive generations. |
| Keywords: | human capital, ageing, cognitive skills, literacy, cohort effects |
| JEL: | I20 J14 J24 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10017&r=edu |
| By: | Serneels, Pieter (University of East Anglia); Beegle, Kathleen (World Bank); Dillon, Andrew (Michigan State University) |
| Abstract: | Returns to education remain an important parameter of interest in economic analysis. A large literature estimates returns to education in the labor market, often carefully addressing issues such as selection, both into wage employment and in terms of completed schooling. There has been much less exploration whether estimated returns are robust to survey design. Specifically, do returns to education differ depending on how information about wage work is collected? Using a survey experiment in Tanzania, this paper investigates whether survey methods matter for estimating mincerian returns to education. Results show that estimated returns vary by questionnaire design, but not by whether the information on employment and wages is self-reported or collected by a proxy respondent (another household member). The differences due to questionnaire type are substantial varying from 6 percentage points higher returns to education for the highest educated men, to 14 percentage points higher for the least educated women, after allowing for non-linearity and endogeneity in the estimation of these parameters. These differences are of similar magnitudes as the bias in OLS estimation, which receives considerable attention in the literature. The findings underline that survey design matters for the estimation of structural parameters, and that care is needed when comparing across contexts and over time, in particular when data is generated by different surveys. |
| Keywords: | returns to education, survey design, field experiment, development, Africa |
| JEL: | J24 J31 C83 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10002&r=edu |
| By: | Emilie Bagby; Anca Dumitrescu; Cara Orfield; Matt Sloan |
| Abstract: | The IMAGINE project was designed to improve educational outcomes of girls in Niger. This report documents the main findings from the three-year long-term evaluation of the IMAGINE project. |
| Keywords: | Niger, IMAGINE, long-term, evaluation |
| JEL: | F Z |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:98a4a5fd10a54222ae00cbdeb99f50bb&r=edu |
| By: | Eyal Apatov (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research); Arthur Grimes (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research) |
| Abstract: | We examine the relationship between the presence of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and local growth, using a sample of 57 New Zealand Territorial Local Authorities (TLAs) between 1986 and 2013. Our models include a large set of controls, including past growth. An innovation of our approach is that we include official population projections as a control to account for growth-related factors that were perceived at the time by policy makers, but are otherwise unobservable to the econometrician. Holding all else equal, we find that a greater university share of Equivalent Full Time Students (EFTS) to working-age population raises population and employment growth. At the means, a one percentage point increase in university EFTS share is associated with a 0.19 (0.14) percentage point increase in the annual average population (employment) growth rate. This relationship holds under all alternative specifications, including different HEI activity definitions, samples, and specifications. On the other hand, growth related to polytechnic activity was estimated less precisely, and is much smaller. While our results suggest a positive association between university activity and growth, we find no evidence for complementarities between HEI activity and several indicators of urbanisation and innovation, nor do we find evidence that HEI presence affected the industrial (sectoral) structure of the local economy. |
| Keywords: | Universities; Polytechnics; Regional Growth, Patent Activity; Skilled Workforce |
| JEL: | I25 J11 R11 |
| Date: | 2016–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mtu:wpaper:16_11&r=edu |
| By: | Emilie Bagby; Evan Borkum; Anca Dumitrescu; Matt Sloan |
| Keywords: | Niger, Education, community, strengthening |
| JEL: | F Z |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:07c424a7912347a78d5e29651d90172b&r=edu |
| By: | Emilie Bagby; Anca Dumitrescu; Cara Orfield; Matt Sloan |
| Abstract: | The IMAGINE project was designed to improve educational outcomes of girls in Niger. This report documents the main findings from the three-year long-term evaluation of the IMAGINE project. |
| Keywords: | Niger, IMAGINE, long-term, evaluation |
| JEL: | F Z |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:f8404bbfd4eb4276a7925d3004a16bf7&r=edu |
| By: | Carlos Henrique Corseuil (IPEA); Miguel Foguel (IPEA); Gustavo Gonzaga (Department of Economics, PUC-Rio) |
| Abstract: | The objective of this paper is to evaluate the Brazilian Apprenticeship program (Lei do Aprendiz). This program is a youth-targeted ALMP that has been adopted at a large scale since 2000 in Brazil. The program concedes payroll subsidies to firms that hire and train young workers under special temporary contracts aiming to help them successfully complete the transition from school to work. We make use of a very rich longitudinal matched employee-employer dataset covering the universe of formally employed workers in Brazil, including apprentices. Our identification strategy exploits a discontinuity by age in the eligibility to enter the program in the early 2000’s, when 17 was the age limit to take part in the program. We examine the impacts on employability, wage growth and attachment to the formal labor market using other temporary workers as a control group. We find that the program increases the probability of employment in permanent jobs in 2-3- and 4-5-year horizons. We also find a positive impact on real wages that increases over time. These results hold when we isolate the effects of the training dimension of the program by using an alternative control group composed of subsidized temporary workers. We show evidence that the positive effects of the program are much larger for less-educated workers and for workers who had their first jobs in large firms. These results are robust to other choices of methods to address selection into the program based on unobservables. Creation-Date: 2016-04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rio:texdis:651&r=edu |
| By: | Todd R. Jones; Ronald G. Ehrenberg |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates which attributes of a Carnegie PhD-level institution predict the share and number of its undergraduate humanities BA recipients that will go on to earn a humanities PhD. We use restricted-access individual-level Survey of Earned Doctorates data from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to determine both where and when PhD recipients received their BA. We use a truncation-correction methodology to account for problems inherent with studying PhD recipients, who often will receive their PhD after the data end. Using OLS, negative binomial regression, and an analysis similar to that of a prior, related paper, we find robust relationships between PhD production and student test scores, instructional expenditures per student, and the number of highly-ranked humanities PhD programs an institution has. |
| JEL: | I23 |
| Date: | 2016–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:22372&r=edu |
| By: | Alexandra Resch; Jonah Deutsch |
| Keywords: | Teacher value added, Charleston County School District, education |
| JEL: | I |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mpr:mprres:bb504288aa94415fb899b4b4f2179aaf&r=edu |