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Choice and Competition in Local Education Markets

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Author Info
Patrick Bayer
Robert McMillan

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Abstract

Prompted by widespread concerns about public school quality, a growing empirical literature has measured the effects of greater choice on school performance. This paper contributes to that literature in three ways. First, it makes the observation that the overall effect of greater choice, which has been the focus of prior research, can be decomposed into demand and supply components: knowing the relative sizes of the two is very relevant for policy. Second, using rich data from a large metropolitan area, it provides a direct and intuitive measure of the competition each school faces. This takes the form of a school-specific elasticity that measures the extent to which reductions in school quality would lead to reductions in demand. Third, the paper provides evidence that these elasticity measures are strongly related to school performance: a one-standard deviation increase in the competitiveness of a school's local environment within the Bay Area leads to a 0.15 standard deviation increase in average test scores. This positive correlation is robust and is consistent with strong supply responsiveness on the part of public schools, of relevance to the broader school choice debate.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 11802.

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Date of creation: Nov 2005
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11802

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods
R21 - Urban, Rural, and Regional Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. D. N. Figlio & J. A. Stone, . "School Choice and Student Performance: Are Private Schools Really Better?," Institute for Research on Poverty Discussion Papers 1141-97, University of Wisconsin Institute for Research on Poverty. [Downloadable!]
  2. Barrow, Lisa & Rouse, Cecilia Elena, 2004. "Using market valuation to assess public school spending," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 1747-1769, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  3. Hanushek, Eric A. & Rivkin, Steven G., 2006. "Teacher Quality," Handbook of the Economics of Education, Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Daniel Millimet; Vasudha Rangaprasad, 2004. "Strategic Competition Amongst Public Schools," Econometric Society 2004 North American Summer Meetings 197, Econometric Society. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  5. Patrick Bayer & Fernando Ferreira & Robert McMillan, 2007. "A Unified Framework for Measuring Preferences for Schools and Neighborhoods," NBER Working Papers 13236, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  6. Nechyba, Thomas J, 1999. " School Finance Induced Migration and Stratification Patterns: The Impact of Private School Vouchers," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 1(1), pages 5-50. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  7. Steven T. Berry, 1994. "Estimating Discrete-Choice Models of Product Differentiation," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 25(2), pages 242-262, Summer. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Eric A. Hanushek & Steven G. Rivkin, 2003. "Does Public School Competition Affect Teacher Quality?," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of School Choice, pages 23-48 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
  9. Jesse M. Rothstein, 2006. "Good Principals or Good Peers? Parental Valuation of School Characteristics, Tiebout Equilibrium, and the Incentive Effects of Competition among Jurisdictions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(4), pages 1333-1350, September. [Downloadable!]
  10. Epple, Dennis & Figlio, David & Romano, Richard, 2004. "Competition between private and public schools: testing stratification and pricing predictions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1215-1245, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  11. Fernandez, Raquel & Rogerson, Richard, 1996. "Income Distribution, Communities, and the Quality of Public Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 111(1), pages 135-64, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  12. Patrick Bayer & Robert McMillan & Kim Rueben, 2004. "An Equilibrium Model of Sorting in an Urban Housing Market," NBER Working Papers 10865, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Julie Berry Cullen & Brian A. Jacob & Steven Levitt, 2003. "The Effect of School Choice on Student Outcomes: Evidence from Randomized Lotteries," NBER Working Papers 10113, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  14. Fernando Ferreira, 2008. "You Can Take it With You: Proposition 13 Tax Benefits, Residential Mobility, and Willingness to Pay for Housing Amenities," Working Papers 08-15, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau. [Downloadable!]
  15. Dennis Epple & Thomas Romer & Holger Sieg, 2001. "Interjurisdictional Sorting and Majority Rule: An Empirical Analysis," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(6), pages 1437-1465, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Holger Sieg & V. Kerry Smith & H. Spencer Banzhaf & Randy Walsh, . "Estimating the General Equilibrium Benefits of Large Changes in Spatially Delineated Public Goods," GSIA Working Papers 2003-07, Carnegie Mellon University, Tepper School of Business.
    Other versions:
  17. Epple, Dennis & Romano, Richard E, 1998. "Competition between Private and Public Schools, Vouchers, and Peer-Group Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(1), pages 33-62, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  18. Benabou, Roland, 1993. "Workings of a City: Location, Education, and Production," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 108(3), pages 619-52, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  19. Walsh, Randy, 2007. "Endogenous open space amenities in a locational equilibrium," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 319-344, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  20. Borland, Melvin V. & Howsen, Roy M, 1992. "Student academic achievement and the degree of market concentration in education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 31-39, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  21. Sandra E. Black, 1999. "Do Better Schools Matter? Parental Valuation Of Elementary Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 114(2), pages 577-599, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  22. Berry, Steven & Levinsohn, James & Pakes, Ariel, 1995. "Automobile Prices in Market Equilibrium," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 63(4), pages 841-90, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  23. Dennis Epple & Holger Sieg, 1999. "Estimating Equilibrium Models of Local Jurisdictions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(4), pages 645-681, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Francisco Gallego & Andrés Hernando, 2009. "School Choice in Chile: Looking at the Demand Side," Documentos de Trabajo 356, Instituto de Economía. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.. [Downloadable!]
  2. Victor Lavy, 2006. "From Forced Busing to Free Choice in Public Schools: Quasi-Experimental Evidence of Individual and General Effects," NBER Working Papers 11969, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Stephen Gibbons & Stephen Machin & Olmo Silva, 2006. "Choice, Competition and Pupil Achievement," IZA Discussion Papers 2214, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Simon Burgess & Helen Slater, 2006. "Using Boundary Changes to Estimate the Impact of School Competition on Test Scores," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 06/158, Department of Economics, University of Bristol, UK. [Downloadable!]
  5. Stephen Gibbons & Stephen Machin & Olmo Silva, 2009. "Valuing School Quality Using Boundary Discontinuities," SERC Discussion Papers 0018, Spatial Economics Research Centre, LSE. [Downloadable!]
  6. Chumacero, Romulo & Gómez Caorsi, Daniel & Paredes, Ricardo, 2008. "I would walk 500 miles (if it paid)," MPRA Paper 15125, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Dec 2008. [Downloadable!]
  7. Simon Burgess & Adam Briggs, 2006. "School Assignment, School Choice and Social Mobility," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 06/157, Department of Economics, University of Bristol, UK. [Downloadable!]
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