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Does Head Start Improve Children's Life Chances? Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design

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Author Info
Ludwig, Jens (Georgetown U)
Miller, Douglas L. (U of California, Davis)

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Abstract

This paper exploits a new source of variation in Head Start funding to identify the program's effects on health and schooling. In 1965 the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) provided technical assistance to the 300 poorest counties in the U.S. to develop Head Start funding proposals. The result was a large and lasting discontinuity in Head Start funding rates at the OEO cutoff for grant-writing assistance, but no discontinuity in other forms of federal social spending. We find evidence of a large negative discontinuity at the OEO cutoff in mortality rates for children ages 5-9 from causes that could be affected by Head Start, but not for other mortality causes or birth cohorts that should not be affected by the program. We also find suggestive evidence for a positive effect of Head Start on educational attainment in both the 1990 Census, concentrated among those cohorts born late enough to have been exposed to the program, and among respondents in the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988.

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Paper provided by University of California at Davis, Department of Economics in its series Working Papers with number 05-34.

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Date of creation: Sep 2005
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Handle: RePEc:ecl:ucdeco:05-34

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs

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  2. Hilary W. Hoynes & Diane Schanzenbach, 2007. "Consumption Responses to In-Kind Transfers: Evidence from the Introduction of the Food Stamp Program," NBER Working Papers 13025, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2009. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," NBER Working Papers 14723, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Guido Imbens & Thomas Lemieux, 2007. "Regression Discontinuity Designs: A Guide to Practice," NBER Working Papers 13039, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Chaudhury, Nazmul & Parajuli, Dilip, 2006. "Conditional cash transfers and female schooling : the impact of the female school stipend program on public school enrollments in Punjab, Pakistan," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4102, The World Bank. [Downloadable!]
  7. John P. Papay & Richard J. Murnane & John B. Willett, 2008. "The Consequences of High School Exit Examinations for Struggling Low-Income Urban Students: Evidence from Massachusetts," NBER Working Papers 14186, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Guido Imbens & Karthik Kalyanaraman, 2009. "Optimal Bandwidth Choice for the Regression Discontinuity Estimator," NBER Working Papers 14726, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Jens Ludwig & Deborah A. Phillips, 2007. "The Benefits and Costs of Head Start," NBER Working Papers 12973, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Maria Knoth Humlum & Rune Majlund Vejlin, 2009. "The Effects of Financial Aid in High School on Academic and Labor Market Outcomes: A Quasi-Experimental Study," Economics Working Papers 2009-02, School of Economics and Management, University of Aarhus. [Downloadable!]
  11. Imbens, Guido W. & Kalyanaraman, Karthik, 2009. "Optimal Bandwidth Choice for the Regression Discontinuity Estimator," IZA Discussion Papers 3995, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
  12. Stefano Gagliarducci & Tommaso Nannicini, 2008. "Do Better Paid Politicians Perform Better? Disentangling Incentives from Selection," Working Papers 346, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University. [Downloadable!]
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  13. Elizabeth U. Cascio, 2009. "Do Investments in Universal Early Education Pay Off? Long-term Effects of Introducing Kindergartens into Public Schools," NBER Working Papers 14951, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Douglas Almond & Joseph J. Doyle, Jr. & Amanda E. Kowalski & Heidi Williams, 2008. "Estimating Marginal Returns to Medical Care: Evidence from At-Risk Newborns," NBER Working Papers 14522, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Oliver, Azuara, 2009. "Does Poverty Alleviation Increase Migration? Evidence from Mexico," MPRA Paper 17599, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
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