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Human Capital Accumulation in a Federation

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  • Daniele Coen-Pirani

    (University of Pittsburgh)

Abstract

More than half of the variation across U.S. school districts in real K-12 education expenditures per student is due to differences between, rather than within, states. I study the welfare implications of redistribution of education expenditures by the Federal government, using an analytically tractable model of human capital accumulation with heterogeneous agents and endogenous state policies. The net welfare effect of Federal redistribution depends on a trade-off between the positive effect of redistributing resources toward poorer states and the negative effect resulting from misallocation of population across states. Federal redistribution increases welfare in a calibrated version of the model.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniele Coen-Pirani, 2014. "Human Capital Accumulation in a Federation," Working Papers 2014-024, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    • Handle: RePEc:hka:wpaper:2014-024
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    human capital; education expenditures; redistribution; federal; local; state governments; geographic mobility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • H70 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - General
    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • J60 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - General

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