IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/19915.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Dynamic Effects of Educational Accountability

Author

Listed:
  • Hugh Macartney

Abstract

This paper provides the first evidence that value-added education accountability schemes induce dynamic distortions. Extending earlier dynamic moral hazard models, I propose a new test for ratchet effects, showing that classroom inputs are distorted less when schools face a shorter horizon over which they can influence student performance. I then exploit grade span variation using rich educational data to credibly identify the extent of dynamic gaming, finding compelling evidence of ratchet effects based on a triple-differences approach. Further analysis indicates that these effects are driven primarily by effort distortions, with teacher reallocations playing a secondary role.

Suggested Citation

  • Hugh Macartney, 2014. "The Dynamic Effects of Educational Accountability," NBER Working Papers 19915, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19915
    Note: CH ED LS PE
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w19915.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Raj Chetty & John N. Friedman & Jonah E. Rockoff, 2011. "The Long-Term Impacts of Teachers: Teacher Value-Added and Student Outcomes in Adulthood," NBER Working Papers 17699, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Robert Bifulco & Helen F. Ladd, 2006. "The Impacts of Charter Schools on Student Achievement: Evidence from North Carolina," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 1(1), pages 50-90, January.
    3. David J. Cooper, 1999. "Gaming against Managers in Incentive Systems: Experimental Results with Chinese Students and Chinese Managers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(4), pages 781-804, September.
    4. David P. Baron & David Besanko, 1987. "Commitment and Fairness in a Dynamic Regulatory Relationship," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 54(3), pages 413-436.
    5. Randall Reback & Julie Berry Cullen, 2006. "Tinkering toward accolades: School gaming under a performance accountability system," Working Papers 0601, Barnard College, Department of Economics.
    6. Thomas S. Dee & Brian Jacob, 2011. "The impact of no Child Left Behind on student achievement," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(3), pages 418-446, June.
    7. Allen, Douglas W. & Lueck, Dean, 1999. "Searching For Ratchet Effects In Agricultural Contracts," Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Western Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 24(2), pages 1-17, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Figlio, D. & Karbownik, K. & Salvanes, K.G., 2016. "Education Research and Administrative Data," Handbook of the Economics of Education,, Elsevier.
    2. Barrera-Osorio, Felipe & Raju, Dhushyanth, 2017. "Teacher performance pay: Experimental evidence from Pakistan," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 148(C), pages 75-91.
    3. Karachiwalla, Naureen & Park, Albert, 2017. "Promotion incentives in the public sector: Evidence from Chinese schools," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 109-128.

    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. Hugh Macartney, 2016. "The Dynamic Effects of Educational Accountability," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(1), pages 1-28.
    2. Cardella, Eric & Depew, Briggs, 2016. "Testing for the Ratchet Effect: Evidence from a Real-Effort Work Task," IZA Discussion Papers 9981, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. David J. Deming & Sarah Cohodes & Jennifer Jennings & Christopher Jencks, 2016. "School Accountability, Postsecondary Attainment, and Earnings," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(5), pages 848-862, December.
    4. Cardella, Eric & Depew, Briggs, 2018. "Output restriction and the ratchet effect: Evidence from a real-effort work task," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 182-202.
    5. Richardson, J.T., 2015. "Accountability incentives and academic achievement: Distributional impacts of accountability when standards are set low," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 1-16.
    6. Seth Gershenson, 2016. "Performance Standards and Employee Effort: Evidence From Teacher Absences," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(3), pages 615-638, June.
    7. Pierre Koning & Karen Wiel, 2012. "School Responsiveness to Quality Rankings: An Empirical Analysis of Secondary Education in the Netherlands," De Economist, Springer, vol. 160(4), pages 339-355, December.
    8. Aucejo, Esteban & Romano, Teresa & Taylor, Eric S., 2019. "Does evaluation distort teacher effort and decisions? Quasi-experimental evidence from a policy of retesting students," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 102689, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. repec:mpr:mprres:8005 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Feng, Li & Figlio, David & Sass, Tim, 2018. "School accountability and teacher mobility," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 1-17.
    11. Eric A. Hanushek & Ludger Woessmann, 2011. "How much do educational outcomes matter in OECD countries? [‘Accountability and flexibility in public schools: Evidence from Boston’s charters and pilots’]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 26(67), pages 427-491.
    12. Gary Charness & Peter Kuhn & Marie Claire Villeval, 2011. "Competition and the Ratchet Effect," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 29(3), pages 513-547.
    13. Gary Henry & Roderick Rose & Doug Lauen, 2014. "Are value-added models good enough for teacher evaluations? Assessing commonly used models with simulated and actual data," Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación volume 9, in: Adela García Aracil & Isabel Neira Gómez (ed.), Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación 9, edition 1, volume 9, chapter 20, pages 383-405, Asociación de Economía de la Educación.
    14. Burgess, Simon, 2016. "Human Capital and Education: The State of the Art in the Economics of Education," IZA Discussion Papers 9885, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Gershenson, Seth & Holt, Stephen B. & Papageorge, Nicholas W., 2015. "Who Believes in Me? The Effect of Student-Teacher Demographic Match on Teacher Expectations," IZA Discussion Papers 9202, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. repec:umc:wpaper:1308 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Lohr Sharon L., 2012. "The Value Deming's Ideas Can Add to Educational Evaluation," Statistics, Politics and Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2), pages 1-42, June.
    18. Stephen Billings & Eric J. Brunner & Stephen L. Ross, 2014. "The Housing and Educational Consequences of the School Choice Provisions of NCLB: Evidence from Charlotte, NC," Working papers 2014-21, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics.
    19. Brian Jacob & Jens Ludwig, 2008. "Improving Educational Outcomes for Poor Children," NBER Working Papers 14550, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Brian P. Gill & Jennifer S. Lerner & Paul Meosky, "undated". "Re-Imagining Accountability in K-12 Education: A Behavioral Science Perspective," Mathematica Policy Research Reports d0c19d0709b641259fe391b2e, Mathematica Policy Research.
    21. Helen F. Ladd & Charles T. Clotfelter & John B. Holbein, 2017. "The Growing Segmentation of the Charter School Sector in North Carolina," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 12(4), pages 536-563, Fall.
    22. Craig, Steven G. & Imberman, Scott A. & Perdue, Adam, 2015. "Do administrators respond to their accountability ratings? The response of school budgets to accountability grades," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 55-68.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J33 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Compensation Packages; Payment Methods
    • M52 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Compensation and Compensation Methods and Their Effects

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:nbr:nberwo:19915. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.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.