Why do some students learn more in some schools than others? One consideration receiving growing attention is school management. To study this, researchers need to be able to measure school management accurately and cheaply at scale, and also explain any observed relationship between school management and student learning. This paper introduces a new approach to measurement using existing public data, and applies it to build a management index covering 15,000 schools across 65 countries, and another index covering nearly all public schools in Brazil. Both indices show a strong, positive relationship between school management and student learning. The paper then develops a simple model that formalizes the intuition that strong management practices might be driving learning gains via incentive and selection effects among teachers, students and parents. The paper shows that the predictions of this model hold in public data for Latin America, and draws out implications for policy.
{"title":"Measuring and Explaining Management in Schools: New Approaches Using Public Data","authors":"C. Leaver, R. Lemos, Daniela Dillenburg Scur","doi":"10.1596/1813-9450-9053","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-9053","url":null,"abstract":"Why do some students learn more in some schools than others? One consideration receiving growing attention is school management. To study this, researchers need to be able to measure school management accurately and cheaply at scale, and also explain any observed relationship between school management and student learning. This paper introduces a new approach to measurement using existing public data, and applies it to build a management index covering 15,000 schools across 65 countries, and another index covering nearly all public schools in Brazil. Both indices show a strong, positive relationship between school management and student learning. The paper then develops a simple model that formalizes the intuition that strong management practices might be driving learning gains via incentive and selection effects among teachers, students and parents. The paper shows that the predictions of this model hold in public data for Latin America, and draws out implications for policy.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133372570","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
What was the return to education in the United States at mid-century? In 1940, the correlation between years of schooling and earnings was relatively low, less than it had been in 1915 or than it would be in later decades. In this paper, we estimate the causal return to schooling in 1940, constructing a large linked sample of twin brothers to account for differences in unobserved ability and family background. Though imperfect, the twins identification strategy allows us to compare the return to education to recent studies implemented similarly. We find that the return to education was relatively low in 1940, with each additional year of schooling increasing labor earnings by approximately 4%. Returns to education were evident both within and across occupations and were higher for sons born to lower SES families.
{"title":"The Return to Education in the Mid-20th Century: Evidence from Twins","authors":"J. Feigenbaum, Hui Ren Tan","doi":"10.3386/w26407","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/w26407","url":null,"abstract":"What was the return to education in the United States at mid-century? In 1940, the correlation between years of schooling and earnings was relatively low, less than it had been in 1915 or than it would be in later decades. In this paper, we estimate the causal return to schooling in 1940, constructing a large linked sample of twin brothers to account for differences in unobserved ability and family background. Though imperfect, the twins identification strategy allows us to compare the return to education to recent studies implemented similarly. We find that the return to education was relatively low in 1940, with each additional year of schooling increasing labor earnings by approximately 4%. Returns to education were evident both within and across occupations and were higher for sons born to lower SES families.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-10-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115134203","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
o what extent did an expansion and contraction of credit drive the housing boom and bust? The existing literature lacks consensus, with findings ranging from credit having no effect to credit driving the entire house price cycle. We show that the key difference behind these disparate results is how rental markets are modeled: assuming perfect segmentation between rental and owner-occupied housing leads to large effects of credit on house prices, while assuming frictionless rental markets makes credit irrelevant for house prices. We develop a model with frictional rental markets that nests both extremes and allows us to consider intermediate cases. We argue that the relative elasticity of the price-to-rent ratio and homeownership with respect to an identified credit shock is a sufficient statistic to measure these frictions, estimate this moment, and use it to calibrate our model. Our result imply that rental markets are highly frictional and close to segmented, consistent with large effects of credit on house prices. Experiments using the structural model imply that credit conditions explain 47% - 57% of the rise in price-rent ratios over the boom.
{"title":"Do Credit Conditions Move House Prices?","authors":"Daniel L. Greenwald, Adam M. Guren","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3535224","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3535224","url":null,"abstract":"o what extent did an expansion and contraction of credit drive the housing boom and bust? The existing literature lacks consensus, with findings ranging from credit having no effect to credit driving the entire house price cycle. We show that the key difference behind these disparate results is how rental markets are modeled: assuming perfect segmentation between rental and owner-occupied housing leads to large effects of credit on house prices, while assuming frictionless rental markets makes credit irrelevant for house prices. We develop a model with frictional rental markets that nests both extremes and allows us to consider intermediate cases. We argue that the relative elasticity of the price-to-rent ratio and homeownership with respect to an identified credit shock is a sufficient statistic to measure these frictions, estimate this moment, and use it to calibrate our model. Our result imply that rental markets are highly frictional and close to segmented, consistent with large effects of credit on house prices. Experiments using the structural model imply that credit conditions explain 47% - 57% of the rise in price-rent ratios over the boom.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129271589","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Making use of an international survey that directly assesses the participants’ cognitive skills, I study the effect of skills on employment in 32 countries. On average, a one-standard-deviation increase in numeracy skills is associated with an 8.4 percentage-point increase in the probability of being employed, reducing the probability of being out of the labor force and the probability of being unemployed by 6.4 percentage points and 2.1 percentage points, respectively. After controlling for numeracy skills, the estimated employment effect of years spent in education falls by one-third from 2.7 percentage points to 1.8 percentage points. There is considerable heterogeneity across subgroups and countries. Notably, the estimated employment effect of skills tends to be more pronounced in countries with higher unemployment.
{"title":"Employment Effects of Skills Around the World: Evidence from PIAAC","authors":"Damir Stijepic","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2850550","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2850550","url":null,"abstract":"Making use of an international survey that directly assesses the participants’ cognitive skills, I study the effect of skills on employment in 32 countries. On average, a one-standard-deviation increase in numeracy skills is associated with an 8.4 percentage-point increase in the probability of being employed, reducing the probability of being out of the labor force and the probability of being unemployed by 6.4 percentage points and 2.1 percentage points, respectively. After controlling for numeracy skills, the estimated employment effect of years spent in education falls by one-third from 2.7 percentage points to 1.8 percentage points. There is considerable heterogeneity across subgroups and countries. Notably, the estimated employment effect of skills tends to be more pronounced in countries with higher unemployment.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"55 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133591814","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We consider the role played by school leaders in improving pupil attainment, going beyond previous studies by exploring the leadership roles of deputy and assistant heads and classroom-based teachers with additional leadership responsibilities. Using panel data for state-funded secondary schools in England for the period 2010/11-2015/16 we find academy schools typically employ more staff in leadership roles than community schools. Increases in the number of staff in leadership roles below headship level are associated, at least to some extent, with improved school performance in Single Academy Trusts, but this is not the case for schools that are part of Multi Academy Trusts. Our findings suggest that the potential benefits of distributing leadership within schools may only be realised when leaders have sufficient autonomy.
{"title":"What Does Leadership Look Like in Schools and Does it Matter for School Performance?","authors":"L. Stokes, A. Bryson","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3449574","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3449574","url":null,"abstract":"We consider the role played by school leaders in improving pupil attainment, going beyond previous studies by exploring the leadership roles of deputy and assistant heads and classroom-based teachers with additional leadership responsibilities. Using panel data for state-funded secondary schools in England for the period 2010/11-2015/16 we find academy schools typically employ more staff in leadership roles than community schools. Increases in the number of staff in leadership roles below headship level are associated, at least to some extent, with improved school performance in Single Academy Trusts, but this is not the case for schools that are part of Multi Academy Trusts. Our findings suggest that the potential benefits of distributing leadership within schools may only be realised when leaders have sufficient autonomy.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"2 6","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132835453","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Despite being eligible for use in any neighborhood, housing choice vouchers tend to be redeemed in low-opportunity neighborhoods. This paper investigates how landlords contribute to this outcome and how they respond to efforts to change it. We leverage a policy change in Washington, DC, that increased voucher rental payments only in high-rent neighborhoods. Using two waves of a correspondence experiment that bracket the policy change, we show that most opportunity landlords screen out prospective voucher tenants, and we detect no change in average screening behavior after a $450 per month increase in voucher payments. In lease-up data, however, enough landlords do respond to increased payments to equalize the flow of voucher tenants into high- vs. low-rent neighborhoods. Using tax data and listings from a website specializing in subsidized housing, we characterize a group of marginal opportunity landlords who respond to higher payments. Marginal opportunity landlords are relatively rare, list their units near market rates, operate on a small scale, and negatively select into the voucher program based on hard-to-observe differences in unit quality.
{"title":"Landlords and Access to Opportunity","authors":"Dionissi Aliprantis, Hal Martin, D. Phillips","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3320770","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3320770","url":null,"abstract":"Despite being eligible for use in any neighborhood, housing choice vouchers tend to be redeemed in low-opportunity neighborhoods. This paper investigates how landlords contribute to this outcome and how they respond to efforts to change it. We leverage a policy change in Washington, DC, that increased voucher rental payments only in high-rent neighborhoods. Using two waves of a correspondence experiment that bracket the policy change, we show that most opportunity landlords screen out prospective voucher tenants, and we detect no change in average screening behavior after a $450 per month increase in voucher payments. In lease-up data, however, enough landlords do respond to increased payments to equalize the flow of voucher tenants into high- vs. low-rent neighborhoods. Using tax data and listings from a website specializing in subsidized housing, we characterize a group of marginal opportunity landlords who respond to higher payments. Marginal opportunity landlords are relatively rare, list their units near market rates, operate on a small scale, and negatively select into the voucher program based on hard-to-observe differences in unit quality.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"13 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123824848","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Marta Rubio Codina, Sonya Krutikova, Lina Marcela Cardona Sosa, Raquel Bernal, O. Attanasio, A. Andrew
Global access to preschool has increased dramatically yet preschool quality is often poor. We use a randomized controlled trial to evaluate two approaches to improving the quality of Colombian preschools. We find that the first, which was rolled out nationwide and provides additional resources for materials and new staff, did not benefit children’s development and, unintentionally, led teachers to reduce their involvement in classroom activities. The second approach additionally trains teachers to improve their pedagogical methods. We find this addition offset the negative effects on teacher behavior, improved the quality of teaching and raised children’s cognition, language and school readiness.
{"title":"Preschool Quality and Child Development","authors":"Marta Rubio Codina, Sonya Krutikova, Lina Marcela Cardona Sosa, Raquel Bernal, O. Attanasio, A. Andrew","doi":"10.3386/w26191","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3386/w26191","url":null,"abstract":"Global access to preschool has increased dramatically yet preschool quality is often poor. We use a randomized controlled trial to evaluate two approaches to improving the quality of Colombian preschools. We find that the first, which was rolled out nationwide and provides additional resources for materials and new staff, did not benefit children’s development and, unintentionally, led teachers to reduce their involvement in classroom activities. The second approach additionally trains teachers to improve their pedagogical methods. We find this addition offset the negative effects on teacher behavior, improved the quality of teaching and raised children’s cognition, language and school readiness.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"40 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134187182","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We investigate an unexplored link between the US mortgage spread and business cycle and house price fluctuations in emerging market economies (EMEs). An increase in the US mortgage spread leads to substantially lower output, investment, consumption, house and stock prices, and to an improvement in the trade balance-to-output ratio in EMEs. We find that the financial channel is the main transmission mechanism through which US mortgage spread shocks affect business and house price cycles in EMEs. The US mortgage spread remains a key driver of aggregate economic activity in EMEs when extending the baseline model with alternative domestic and foreign variables, such as global financial risk, and considering alternative country subgroups.
{"title":"Mortgage Spreads, Asset Prices, and Business Cycles in Emerging Countries","authors":"Jaroslav Horvath, P. Rothman","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3123913","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3123913","url":null,"abstract":"We investigate an unexplored link between the US mortgage spread and business cycle and house price fluctuations in emerging market economies (EMEs). An increase in the US mortgage spread leads to substantially lower output, investment, consumption, house and stock prices, and to an improvement in the trade balance-to-output ratio in EMEs. We find that the financial channel is the main transmission mechanism through which US mortgage spread shocks affect business and house price cycles in EMEs. The US mortgage spread remains a key driver of aggregate economic activity in EMEs when extending the baseline model with alternative domestic and foreign variables, such as global financial risk, and considering alternative country subgroups.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"5 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-07-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130342617","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Despite sharply rising prices, the number of companies choosing to sell private long-term care insurance (LTCI) has dropped from over 100 to just over 30 today. This paper analyzes how product mispricing and regulators' political incentives jointly affected insurer participation in the LTCI market. Using detailed pricing data, we find that four attributes of the state regulator -- time to re-election, political capital, political affiliation, and campaign funding -- significantly affected price changes and insurer profits. To understand regulators' equilibrium effects on LTCI supply, we then develop and estimate a dynamic structural model. Our model captures the political incentives of the regulator and produces frictions in product pricing when cost shocks are large and unpredictable. Using the calibrated model, we find that removing regulators' election cycles would significantly increase social welfare -- equivalent to removing 8% of total cost shocks.
{"title":"The Effect of Political Frictions on Long Term Care Insurance","authors":"Weiling Liu, Jessica Liu","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3388542","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3388542","url":null,"abstract":"Despite sharply rising prices, the number of companies choosing to sell private long-term care insurance (LTCI) has dropped from over 100 to just over 30 today. This paper analyzes how product mispricing and regulators' political incentives jointly affected insurer participation in the LTCI market. Using detailed pricing data, we find that four attributes of the state regulator -- time to re-election, political capital, political affiliation, and campaign funding -- significantly affected price changes and insurer profits. To understand regulators' equilibrium effects on LTCI supply, we then develop and estimate a dynamic structural model. Our model captures the political incentives of the regulator and produces frictions in product pricing when cost shocks are large and unpredictable. Using the calibrated model, we find that removing regulators' election cycles would significantly increase social welfare -- equivalent to removing 8% of total cost shocks.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125281860","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
College completion rates declined from the 1970s to the 1990s. We document that this trend has reversed - since the 1990s, college completion rates have increased. We investigate the reasons for the increase in college graduation rates. Collectively, student characteristics, institutional resources, and institution attended do not explain much of the change. However, we document that standards for degree receipt may explain some of the change in graduation rates.
{"title":"Why Have College Completion Rates Increased?","authors":"Jeffrey T. Denning, Eric R. Eide, Merrill Warnick","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3408309","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3408309","url":null,"abstract":"College completion rates declined from the 1970s to the 1990s. We document that this trend has reversed - since the 1990s, college completion rates have increased. We investigate the reasons for the increase in college graduation rates. Collectively, student characteristics, institutional resources, and institution attended do not explain much of the change. However, we document that standards for degree receipt may explain some of the change in graduation rates.","PeriodicalId":143058,"journal":{"name":"Econometric Modeling: Microeconometric Studies of Health","volume":"37 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124476418","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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