IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/econwp/qt9kd0h1cv.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

School Finance Reform and the Distribution of Student Achievement

Author

Listed:
  • Lafortune, Julien
  • Rothstein, Jesse
  • Whitmore Schanzenbach, Diane

Abstract

We study the impact of post-1990 school finance reforms, during the so-called “adequacy” era, on absolute and relative spending and achievement in low-income school districts. Using an event study research design that exploits the apparent randomness of reform timing, we show that reforms lead to sharp, immediate, and sustained increases in spending in low-income school districts. Using representative samples from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, we find that reforms cause increases in the achievement of students in these districts, phasing in gradually over the years following the reform. The implied effect of school resources on educational achievement is large.

Suggested Citation

  • Lafortune, Julien & Rothstein, Jesse & Whitmore Schanzenbach, Diane, 2016. "School Finance Reform and the Distribution of Student Achievement," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt9kd0h1cv, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdl:econwp:qt9kd0h1cv
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/9kd0h1cv.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Card, David & Payne, A. Abigail, 2002. "School finance reform, the distribution of school spending, and the distribution of student test scores," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(1), pages 49-82, January.
    2. C. Kirabo Jackson & Rucker C. Johnson & Claudia Persico, 2016. "The Effects of School Spending on Educational and Economic Outcomes: Evidence from School Finance Reforms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 131(1), pages 157-218.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Manon Garrouste & Miren Lafourcade, 2022. "Place-Based Policies: Opportunity for Deprived Schools or Zone-and-Shame Effect?," Post-Print hal-04329793, HAL.
    2. María Orduz, 2022. "Effect of educational spending on academic performance under different institutional arrangements," Documentos CEDE 20224, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    3. Cécile Bonneau, 2020. "The Concentration of investment in education in the US (1970-2018)," Working Papers halshs-02875965, HAL.
    4. Bo Zhao, 2023. "Estimating the cost function of connecticut public K–12 education: implications for inequity and inadequacy in school spending," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(4), pages 439-470, July.
    5. Rucker C. Johnson & C. Kirabo Jackson, 2019. "Reducing Inequality through Dynamic Complementarity: Evidence from Head Start and Public School Spending," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 11(4), pages 310-349, November.
    6. Jeffrey Clemens & Benedic Ippolito, 2018. "Implications of Medicaid Financing Reform for State Government Budgets," Tax Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(1), pages 135-172.
    7. Eric Brunner & Joshua Hyman & Andrew Ju, 2020. "School Finance Reforms, Teachers' Unions, and the Allocation of School Resources," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 102(3), pages 473-489, July.
    8. Cécile Bonneau, 2020. "The Concentration of investment in education in the US (1970-2018)," World Inequality Lab Working Papers halshs-02875965, HAL.
    9. Jeffrey Clemens & Stan Veuger, 2023. "Intergovernmental Grants and Policy Competition: Concepts, Institutions, and Evidence," NBER Chapters, in: Policy Responses to Tax Competition, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Dinand Webbink & José María Cabrera, 2016. "Do higher salaries yield better teachers and better student outcomes?," Documentos de Trabajo/Working Papers 1604, Facultad de Ciencias Empresariales y Economia. Universidad de Montevideo..
    11. Gigliotti, Philip & Sorensen, Lucy C., 2018. "Educational resources and student achievement: Evidence from the Save Harmless provision in New York State," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 167-182.
    12. Scott Dallman & Anusha Nath & Filip Premik, 2021. "The Effect of Constitutional Provisions on Education Policy and Outcomes," Staff Report 623, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
    13. William N. Evans & Robert M. Schwab & Kathryn L. Wagner, 2019. "The Great Recession and Public Education," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 14(2), pages 298-326, Spring.
    14. Matthew Davis & Fernando V. Ferreira, 2017. "Housing Disease and Public School Finances," NBER Working Papers 24140, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Alex Combs & Erin Troland, 2023. "The Role of Property Assessment Oversight in School Finance Inequality," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2023-024, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    16. Matthew Ridley & Camille Terrier, 2018. "Fiscal and Education Spillovers from Charter School Expansion," NBER Working Papers 25070, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Gregory R. Thorson & Sera M. Gearhart, 2019. "Do Enhanced Funding Policies Targeting Students in Poverty Close Achievement Gaps? Evidence from the American States, 1996–2015," Poverty & Public Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 11(3), pages 205-221, September.
    18. Ding, Yanqing & Lu, Fengming & Ye, Xiaoyang, 2020. "Intergovernmental transfer under heterogeneous accountabilities: The effects of the 2006 Chinese Education Finance Reform," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    19. Kendra Bischoff & Ann Owens, 2019. "The Segregation of Opportunity: Social and Financial Resources in the Educational Contexts of Lower- and Higher-Income Children, 1990–2014," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(5), pages 1635-1664, October.
    20. Davis, Matthew & Ferreira, Fernando, 2022. "Housing disease and public school finances," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social and Behavioral Sciences; School; Finance; Student Achievement;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H75 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Government: Health, Education, and Welfare
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I22 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Educational Finance; Financial Aid
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • I28 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Government Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdl:econwp:qt9kd0h1cv. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lisa Schiff (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ibbrkus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.