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Angrist, Joshua D. and Victor Lavy (1996).
The Effect of Teen Childbearing and Single Parenthood on Childhood Disabilities and Progress in School.
In: NBER Working Paper
5807
.
Abstract.
Link.
Teen and out-of-wedlock child-bearing are often thought to be responsible for poor health and low levels of schooling among the children of young mothers. This paper uses special disability and grade repetition questions from the school enrollment supplement to the 1992 Current Population Survey to estimate the effect of maternal age and single parenthood on children's disability status and school progress. Our results suggest that there is little association between maternal age at birth and children's disabilities. But the children of teen mothers are much more likely to repeat one or more grades than other children, and within-household estimates of this relationship are even larger than OLS estimates. The grade repetition findings from the CPS are replicated using a smaller sample from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. Another finding of interest is that having a father in the household is associated with lower disability prevalence and fewer grade repetitions. But many of the effects of single parenthood on disability, as well as the effect on grade repetition, appear to be explained by higher incomes in two-parent families. [close]
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Benhabib, Jess and Mark Spiegel (1994).
The Role of Human Capital in Economic Development, Evidence from Aggregate Cross-Country Data.
In: Journal of Monetary Economics
34(2)
, 143-173
.
Abstract.
Link.
Using cross-country estimates of physical and human capital stocks, we run the growth accounting regressions implied by a Cobb-Douglas aggregate production function. Our results indicate that human capital enters insignificantly in explaining per capita growth rates. We next specify an alternative model in which the growth rate of total factor productivity depends on a nation's human capital stock level. Tests of this specification do indicate a positive role for human capital. [close]
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Calvo-Armengol, Antoni, Eleonora Patacchini and Yves Zenou (2009).
Peer Effects and Social Networks in Education.
In: Review of Economic Studies
76(4)
, 1239-1267
.
Abstract.
Link.
We develop a model that shows that, at the Nash equilibrium, the outcome of each individual embedded in a network is proportional to his/her Katz–Bonacich centrality measure. This measure takes into account both direct and indirect friends of each individual, but puts less weight to his/her distant friends. We then bring the model to the data using a very detailed dataset of adolescent friendship networks. We show that, after controlling for observable individual characteristics and unobservable network specific factors, a standard deviation increase in the Katz–Bonacich centrality increases the pupil school performance by more than 7% of one standard deviation. [close]
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Cascio, Elisabeth U. (2009).
Maternal Labor Supply and the Introduction of Kindergartens into American Public Schools.
In: Journal of Human Resources
44(1)
, 140-170
.
Abstract.
Link.
Since the mid-1960s, many state governments have introduced subsidies for school districts that offer kindergarten. This paper uses the staggered timing and age targeting of these grants to examine how the childcare subsidy implicit in public schooling affects maternal labor supply. Using data from five Censuses, I estimate that four of ten single mothers with no younger children entered the work force with public school enrollment of a five-year-old child. No significant labor supply responses are detected among other mothers with eligible children. Results also indicate that at least one in three marginal public school enrollees would have otherwise attended private school. [close]
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Choi, Seung Mo (2011).
How Large are Learning Externalities?.
In: International Economic Review
52(4)
, 1077-103
.
Abstract.
Link.
The quantitative features of human capital externalities are not fully understood. Although static externalities are estimated in some studies, learning externalities remain mostly unestimated. By calibrating a growth model, this article provides an estimate of learning externalities. The calibration uses an equilibrium condition that equates private returns on physical capital and human capital. The results suggest that sizable learning externalities exist, even in a conservative setup. The estimated social rate of return on human capital is 9.0%, compared to the private rate of return, 6.6%. Therefore, human capital externalities are an important source of economic growth. [close]
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Cipollone, Piero and Alfonso Rosolia (2007).
Social Interactions in High School: Lessons from an Earthquake.
In: American Economic Review
97(3)
, 948-965
.
Abstract.
Link.
After an earthquake hit Southern Italy in 1980, young men from certain towns were exempted from compulsory military service. We show that the exemption raised high-school-graduation rates of boys by more than 2 percentage points. We do this by comparing high-school-graduation rates of young exempt men and older nonexempt men from the least damaged areas and men of the same age groups from nearby towns that were not hit by the quake. Similar comparisons show that graduation rates of young women in the affected areas also increased. Since in Italy women are not subject to the draft, the findings suggest the presence of spillover effects. [close]
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Crista, Julian P. (2008).
The Effect of a First Child on Female Labor Supply: Evidence from Women Seeking Fertility Services.
In: Journal of Human Resources
43(3)
, 487-510
.
Abstract.
Link.
Estimating the causal effect of a first child on female labor supply is complicated by the endogeneity of fertility. This paper addresses this problem by focusing on a sample of women from the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) who sought help to become pregnant. After a certain period, only some of these women gave birth. Results using this strategy show that having a first child younger than one year old reduces female employment by 26 percentage points. These estimates are close to OLS estimates from census data and to those from OLS and fixed-effects models on NSFG data. [close]
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Fack, Gabrielle and Julien Grenet (2010).
When do better schools raise housing prices? Evidence from Paris public and private schools.
In: Journal of Public Economics
94(1-2)
, 59-77
.
Abstract.
Link.
In this paper, we investigate how housing prices react to the quality of education offered by neighboring public and private schools. The organization of secondary schooling in the city of Paris, which combines residence-based assignment to public schools with a well-developed and almost entirely publicly funded private school system, offers a valuable empirical context for analyzing how private schools affect the capitalization of public school performance in housing prices. Using comprehensive data on both schools and real estate transactions over the period 1997–2004, we develop a matching framework to carefully compare sales across school attendance boundaries. We find that a standard deviation increase in public school performance raises housing prices by 1.4 to 2.4%. Moreover, we show that the capitalization of public school performance in the price of real estate shrinks as the availability of private schools increases in the neighborhood. Our results confirm the predictions of general equilibrium models of school choice that private schools, by providing an advantageous outside option to parents, tend to mitigate the impact of public school performance on housing prices. [close]
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Feldman, Jacob, Diane Makuc, Joel Kleinman and Joan Cornoni-Huntly (1989).
National Trends in Educational Differences in Mortality.
In: American Journal of Epidemiology
129(5)
, 919-933
.
Abstract.
Link.
The authors examined national changes in socioeconomic differentials in mortality for middle-aged and older white men and women in the United States with the use of 1960 data from the Matched Records Study and 1971–1984 data from the first National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES I) Epidemiologic Followup Study (NHEFS). In 1960, there was little difference in mortality by educational level among middle-aged and older men. Since 1960, death rates among men declined more rapidly for the more educated than the less educated, which resulted in substantial educational differentials in mortality in 1971–1984. In contrast, among women, death rates declined at about the same rate regardless of educational attainment, so that a strong inverse relation between education and mortality in 1960 remained about the same magnitude during 1971–1984. Trends in educational differentials for heart disease mortality are responsible for much of the change for all causes of death. Relative risk estimates based on the NHEFS indicate that after taking into account selected baseline risk factors the least educated are still at substantially elevated risk of death from heart disease, ranging from a relative risk of 1.38 for men aged 65–74 years at baseline to 2.27 for men aged 45–64 years. Reasons for the observed educational differentials and their changes over time are not easily explained and are likely to be multifactorial. [close]
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Figlio, David, Jonathan Guryan, Krzysztof Karbownik and Jeffrey Roth (2014).
The Effects of Poor Neonatal Health on Children's Cognitive Development.
In: American Economic Review
104 (12)
, 3921-3955
.
Abstract.
Link.
We make use of a new data resource — merged birth and school records for all children born in Florida from 1992 to 2002—to study the relationship between birth weight and cognitive development. Using singletons as well as twin and sibling fixed effects models, we find that the effects of early health on cognitive development are essentially constant through the school career; that these effects are similar across a wide range of family backgrounds; and that they are invariant to measures of school quality. We conclude that the effects of early health on adult outcomes are therefore set very early. [close]
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Fletcher, Jason M. and Barbara L. Wolfe (2009).
Education and Labor Market Consequences of Teenage Childbearing: Evidence Using the Timing of Pregnancy Outcomes and Community Fixed Effects.
In: Journal of Human Resources
44(2)
, 303-325
.
Abstract.
Link.
The question of whether giving birth as a teenager has negative economic consequences for the mother remains controversial despite substantial research. In this paper, we build upon existing literature, especially the literature that uses the experience of teenagers who had a miscarriage as the appropriate comparison group. We show that miscarriages are not random events, but rather are likely correlated with (unobserved) community-level factors, casting some doubt on previous findings. Including community-level fixed effects in our specifications lead to important changes in our estimates. By making use of information on the timing of miscarriages as well as birth control choices preceding the teenage pregnancies we construct more relevant control groups for teenage mothers. We find evidence that teenage childbearing likely reduces the probability of receiving a high school diploma by 5 to 10 percentage points, reduces annual income as a young adult by $1,000 to $2,400, and may increase the probability of receiving cash assistance and decrease years of schooling. [close]
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Francesconi, Marco and Wilbert Van der Klaauw (2007).
The Socioeconomic Consequences of "In-Work" Benefit Reform for British Lone Mothers.
In: Journal of Human Resources
42(1)
, 01-31
.
Abstract.
Link.
In October 1999, the British government enacted the Working Families' Tax Credit, which aimed at encouraging work among low-income families with children. This paper uses panel data collected between 1991 and 2001 to evaluate the effect of this reform on single mothers. We find that the reform led to a substantial increase in their employment rate of about five percentage points, which was driven by both a higher rate at which lone mothers remained in the labor force and a higher rate at which they entered it. Women's responses were highly heterogeneous, with effects double this size for mothers with one preschool-aged child, and virtually no effect for mothers with multiple older children. The employment increase was accompanied by significant increases in paid childcare utilization and our analysis in fact suggests that the generous childcare credit component of the reform played a key role in explaining the estimated employment and childcare usage responses. We also find that the increase in labor market participation was accompanied by reductions in single mothers' subsequent fertility and in the rate at which they married, behavioral responses, which in turn are likely to influence the reform's overall impact on child poverty and welfare. [close]
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Gould, Eric, Victor Lavy and Daniele Paserman (2004).
Immigrating to Opportunity: Estimating the Effect of School Quality Using a Natural Experiment on Ethiopians in Israel.
In: Quarterly Journal of Economics
119(2)
, 489-526
.
Abstract.
Link.
In May 1991, fifteen thousand Ethiopian Jews were brought to Israel in an overnight airlift and sorted in a haphazard and essentially random fashion to absorption centers across the country. This quasi-random assignment produced a natural experiment whereby the initial schooling environment of Ethiopian children can be considered exogenous to their family background and parental decisions. We examine the extent to which the initial elementary school environment affected the high school outcomes of Ethiopian children, using administrative panel data on the educational career of each child in Israel through much of the 1990s. The results show that the early schooling environment has an important effect on high school dropout rates, repetition rates, and the passing rate on matriculation exams necessary to enter college. The results are robust to using alternative measures of the schooling environment and to the inclusion of community fixedeffects, which suggests that aspects of the elementary school itself are important for high school success. [close]
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Hermannsson, Kristinn, Katerina Lisenkova, Patrizio Lecca, Peter G. McGregor and J. Kim Swales (2016).
The External Benefits of Higher Education.
In: Regional Studies
51(7)
, 1077-1088
.
Abstract.
Link.
The external benefits of higher education. Regional Studies. The private-market benefits of education are widely studied at the micro-level, although the magnitude of their macroeconomic impact is disputed. However, there are additional benefits of education that are less well understood. In this paper the macroeconomic effects of external benefits of higher education are estimated using the ‘micro-to-macro’ simulation approach. Two types of externalities are explored: technology spillovers and productivity spillovers in the labour market. These links are illustrated and the results suggest they could be very large. However, this is qualified by the dearth of microeconomic evidence, for which the authors hope to encourage further work. [close]
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Humlum, Maria K., Kristin J. Kleinjans and Helena S. Nielsen (2012).
An Economic Analysis of Identity and Career Choice.
In: Economic Inquiry
50(1)
, 39-61
.
Abstract.
Link.
Standard economic models tend to be more specific about pecuniary payoffs than nonpecuniary payoffs to education. Based on the ideas of Akerlof and Kranton, we consider a model of career choice and identity where individuals derive nonpecuniary identity payoffs. Using factor analysis on a range of attitude questions, we find two factors related to identity (career orientation and social orientation), which are important for planned educational choices and for observed gender differences. The implication is that policy makers and institutions of higher education need to focus on identity-related issues rather than just improved financial incentives if they aim at attracting high-ability youths to certain careers. [close]
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Hungerman, Daniel M. (2014 ).
The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws.
In: Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization
104
, 52-63
.
Abstract.
Link.
For over a century, social scientists have debated how educational attainment impacts religious belief. In this paper, I use Canadian compulsory schooling laws to identify the relationship between completed schooling and later religiosity. I find that higher levels of education lead to lower levels of religious affiliation later in life. An additional year of education leads to a 4-percentage-point decline in the likelihood that an individual identifies with any religious tradition. This is a reasonably large effect: extrapolating the results to the broader population would suggest that increases in schooling could explain most of the large rise in non-affiliation in Canada in recent decades. [close]
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Iranzo, Susana and Giovanni Peri (2009).
Schooling Externalities, Technology, and Productivity: Theory and Evidence from U.S. States.
In: Review of Economics and Statistics
91(2)
, 420-430
.
Abstract.
Link.
The literature on schooling externalities in U.S. cities and states is rather mixed: positive external effects of average education levels are hardly found while positive externalities from the share of college graduates are more often identified. We propose a simple model to reconcile this mixed evidence. Our model predicts positive externalities from increased college education and negligible external effects from high school education. Using compulsory attendance/child labor laws, push-driven immigration of highly educated workers, and the location of land-grant colleges as instruments for schooling attainments, we test and confirm the model predictions with data on U.S. states for the period 1960-2000. [close]
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Kremer, Michael, Edward Miguel and Rebecca Thornton (2009).
Incentives to Learn.
In: Review of Economics and Statistics
91(3)
, 437-456
.
Abstract.
Link.
We study a randomized evaluation of a merit scholarship program in which Kenyan girls who scored well on academic exams had school fees paid and received a grant. Girls showed substantial exam score gains, and teacher attendance improved in program schools. There were positive externalities for girls with low pretest scores, who were unlikely to win a scholarship. We see no evidence for weakened intrinsic motivation. There were heterogeneous program effects. In one of the two districts, there were large exam gains and positive spillovers to boys. In the other, attrition complicates estimation, but we cannot reject the hypothesis of no program effect. [close]
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Leppämäki, Mikko and Mikko Mustonen (2009).
Skill Signalling with Product Market Externality.
In: Economic Journal
119(539)
, 1130-1142
.
Abstract.
Link.
We propose that signalling in professional labour markets creates product market externalities that affect wages, thus establishing a link between the externality and signalling incentives. Due to signalling activity, a free substitute (negative externality) or complement (positive externality) good appears. For negative or mildly positive externalities, the standard result of signalling at the minimum level obtains. When the positive externality is sufficiently strong, separation occurs, in contrast to the literature, at the maximum rather than at the minimum level of signalling. Very strong positive externalities imply the unique maximum pooling equilibrium. The private market solution may involve too little signalling when compared to the social optimum. [close]
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Lleras-Muney, Adriana (2005).
The Relationship Between Education and Adult Mortality in the United States.
In: Review of Economic Studies
72(1)
, 189-221
.
Abstract.
Link.
Prior research has uncovered a large and positive correlation between education and health. This paper examines whether education has a causal impact on health. I follow synthetic cohorts using successive U.S. censuses to estimate the impact of educational attainment on mortality rates. I use compulsory education laws from 1915 to 1939 as instruments for education. The results suggest that education has a causal impact on mortality, and that this effect is perhaps larger than has been previously estimated in the literature. [close]
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MacLeod, W. Bentley and Miguel Urquiola (2015).
Reputation and School Competition.
In: American Economic Review
105(11)
, 3471-88
.
Abstract.
Link.
Stratification is a distinctive feature of competitive education markets that can be explained by a preference for good peers. Learning externalities can lead students to care about the ability of their peers, resulting in across-school sorting by ability. This paper shows that a preference for good peers, and therefore stratification, can also emerge endogenously from reputational concerns that arise when graduates use their college of origin to signal their ability. Reputational concerns can also explain puzzling observed trends including the increase in student investment into admissions exam preparation, and the decline in study time at college. [close]
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McMahon, Walter W. (2000).
Education and Development: Measuring the Social Benefits.
Oxford :
Oxford University Press
.
Abstract.
Link.
Education is a key area for knowledge-based, globalizing economies. Economies depend on education not only for the diffusion of knowledge and learning of new techniques, but also for long-term poverty reduction and improved health. This book develops a new approach for measuring the social benefits of education and finding more cost-effective policies. [close]
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McMahon, Walter W. (1998).
Conceptual Framework for the Analysis of the Social Benefits of Lifelong Learning.
In: Education Economics
6(3)
, 309-346
.
Abstract.
Link.
This paper systematically identifies the market and non-market returns to education over the life cycle of gruaduates, as well as the social benefits externalities. It considers the most recent developments in the measurement and the valuation of these returns to additions to existing provisions for education and relates them to the costs. This is within the conceptual framework for lifelong learning defined by the graduate's life cycle, given that the capacity of graduates to learn later and to adapt is correlated with their prior schooling. The paper suggests that the capacity to finance lifelong learning depends on the capacity to identify and credibly measure these net social and private benefits, some of which are not well known and about which there is also misinformation. It also concludes that the capacity to finance education depends on political processes, which therefore are analyzed also, and on the capacity to build broad-based coalitions using knowledge about these marginal products. [close]
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Mincer, Jacob (1993).
Human Capital, Technology and the Wage Structure: What do Time Series Show?.
In: Jacob Mincer and Mark Blaug (eds.).
Studies in Human Capital: Collected Essays of Jacob Mincer.
Aldershot U.K.:
Edward Elgar
.
Abstract.
Link.
The major purpose of this study was to detect effects of technologically based changes in demand for human capital on the educational and experience wage structure in annual CPS data, 1963 to 1987. Major findings are: 1. Year-to-year educational wage differentials are quite closely tracked by relative supplies of young graduates, and by indexes of relative demand, such as research and development (R & D) expenditures per worker, and ratios of service to goods employment. Of these, R and D indexes account for most of the explanatory power. Indexes of (Jorgenson type) productivity growth and of international competition are significant as alternatives, but show weaker explanatory power. 2. The observed steepening of experience profiles of wages is explained, in part, by changes in relative demographic supplies (cohort effects), and in part by the growing profitability of human capital which extends to that acquired on the job. Evidence appears in the significance of profitability variables or in demand factors underlying them, given the relative demographic supplies in the wage profile equations. [close]
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Pelkonen, Panu (2012).
Length of Compulsory Education and Voter Turnout—Evidence from a Staged Reform.
In: Public Choice
150(1-2)
, 51-75
.
Abstract.
Link.
This study estimates the impact of education on voter turnout. The identification relies on a reform, which increased the length of compulsory schooling in Norway from seven to nine years. The impact is measured both at the individual, and the municipality level. Both sets of analysis suggest that additional education has no effect on voter turnout. The impact of education on various measures of civic outcomes is also estimated. Of these, only the likelihood of signing a petition is found to be positively affected by education. [close]
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Rauch, James E. (1993).
Productivity Gains from Geographic Concentration of Human Capital: Evidence from the Cities.
In: Journal of Urban Economics
34(3)
, 380-400
.
Abstract.
Link.
Based on recent theoretical developments the argument is made that the average level of human capital is a local public good. Cities with higher average levels of human capital should therefore have higher wages and higher land rents. After conditioning on the characteristics of individual workers and dwellings, this prediction is supported by data for Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas (SMSAs) in the United States, where the SMSA average levels of formal education and work experience are used as proxies for the average level of human capital. The alternative explanations of omitted SMSA variables and self-selection are evaluated. An estimate of the effect of an additional year of average education on total factor productivity is computed. [close]
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Rud, Iryna, Chris Van Klaveren, Wim Groot and Henriette Maassen van den Brink (2014).
The Externalities of Crime: The Effect of Criminal Involvement of Parents on the Educational Attainment of Their Children.
In: Economics of Education Review
38
, 89-103
.
Abstract.
Link.
The empirical literature on education and crime suggests that both criminal behavior and educational attainment are transferred from parents to children. However, the impact of criminal behavior of parents on educational outcomes of children is generally ignored, even though the entailed social costs may be substantial. This study examines the effect of parents’ criminal involvement on the educational attainment of their children. To identify this effect, we combine a multinomial logit model with a Mahalanobis matching approach. The findings suggest that having criminally involved parents (1) increases the probability of finishing primary education as the highest education level attained (7–9 percentage points), and (2) decreases the probability of attaining higher education (2–6 percentage points). These results are robust to various specifications and are unlikely to be fully driven by differences in unobservables. [close]
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Solomon, Lewis C. (1975).
The Relation between Schooling and Saving Behavior.
In: F.T. Juster (ed.).
Education, Income, and Human Behavior.
New York:
McGraw-Hill
.
Abstract.
Link.
In the present study we ask whether individuals save more, or save in different forms, as they become more highly educated, thus conferring benefits either on themselves or on society as a whole. Can we identify an additional benefit from schooling due to different savings behavior, over and above the ability to earn more on the job, to enjoy life more fully, to consume more efficiently, to be more civilized, and so on? Savings behavior may, of course, affect income, thereby altering an individual's total utility, but this influence does not operate directly on earnings; hence the categorization of the effects of saving as indirect. [close]
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Wantchekon, Leonrad, Marko Klašnja and Natalija Novta (2015).
Education and Human Capital Externalities: Evidence from Colonial Benin .
In: Quarterly Journal of Economics
130(2)
, 703-757
.
Abstract.
Link.
Using a unique data set on students from the first regional schools in colonial Benin, we investigate the effect of education on living standards, occupation, and political participation. Since both school locations and student cohorts were selected with very little information, treatment and control groups are balanced on observables. We can therefore estimate the effect of education by comparing the treated to the untreated living in the same village, as well as those living in villages where no schools were set up. We find a significant positive treatment effect of education for the first generation of students, as well as their descendants: they have higher living standards, are less likely to be farmers, and are more likely to be politically active. We find large village-level externalities—descendants of the uneducated in villages with schools do better than those in control villages. We also find extended family externalities—nephews and nieces directly benefit from their uncle’s education—and show that this represents a “family tax,” as educated uncles transfer resources to the extended family. [close]
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Winters, John V. (2013).
Human Capital Externalities and Employment Differences across Metropolitan Areas of the USA.
In: Journal of Economic Geography
13(5)
, 799-822
.
Abstract.
Link.
It has been well documented that employment outcomes often differ considerably across areas. This article examines the extent to which the local human capital level, measured as the share of prime age adults with a college degree, has positive external effects on labor force participation (LFP) and employment for U.S. metropolitan area residents. The empirical results suggest that the local human capital level has positive externalities on the probability of LFP and employment for both women and men. We also find that less educated workers generally receive the largest external benefits. [close]
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de la Fuente, Angel and Antonio Ciccone (2003).
Human Capital and Growth in a Global and Knowledge-Based Economy.
Luxembourg:
Office for Official Publications of the European Communities
.
Abstract.
Link.
This document is a report prepared for the DG for Employment and Social Affairs of the European Commission. It surveys the available evidence on the contribution of investment in human capital to aggregate productivity growth and on its impact on wages and other labour outcomes at the individual level. It also draws some tentative policy conclusions for an average European country. [close]