IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tor/tecipa/tecipa-673.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Estimating the Direct and Indirect Effects of Major Education Reforms

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Gilraine
  • Hugh Macartney
  • Robert McMillan

Abstract

We propose an approach for credibly estimating indirect sorting effects of major education reforms and placing them alongside the reforms’ direct and persistent effects for the first time. Applying our approach to California’s state-wide class size reduction program, we estimate a large positive direct effect of smaller classes on test scores and an even larger indirect effect due to demographic changes as private school students switch into public schools; both effects also persist. Accounting for sorting using these estimates raises the program’s benefit-cost ratio significantly. Further, our analysis indicates that indirect sorting is likely relevant in policy evaluations more generally.

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Gilraine & Hugh Macartney & Robert McMillan, 2020. "Estimating the Direct and Indirect Effects of Major Education Reforms," Working Papers tecipa-673, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:tor:tecipa:tecipa-673
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/public/workingPapers/tecipa-673.pdf
    File Function: Main Text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joseph G. Altonji & Todd E. Elder & Christopher R. Taber, 2005. "Selection on Observed and Unobserved Variables: Assessing the Effectiveness of Catholic Schools," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(1), pages 151-184, February.
    2. Josh Kinsler, 2012. "Beyond Levels and Growth: Estimating Teacher Value-Added and its Persistence," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 47(3), pages 722-753.
    3. Jackson, C. Kirabo, 2012. "School competition and teacher labor markets: Evidence from charter school entry in North Carolina," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(5), pages 431-448.
    4. Joshua D. Angrist & Kevin Lang, 2004. "Does School Integration Generate Peer Effects? Evidence from Boston's Metco Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(5), pages 1613-1634, December.
    5. Raj Chetty & John N. Friedman & Jonah E. Rockoff, 2014. "Measuring the Impacts of Teachers II: Teacher Value-Added and Student Outcomes in Adulthood," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(9), pages 2633-2679, September.
    6. Krueger, Alan B & Whitmore, Diane M, 2001. "The Effect of Attending a Small Class in the Early Grades on College-Test Taking and Middle School Test Results: Evidence from Project STAR," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 111(468), pages 1-28, January.
    7. Joshua D. Angrist & Erich Battistin & Daniela Vuri, 2017. "In a Small Moment: Class Size and Moral Hazard in the Italian Mezzogiorno," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(4), pages 216-249, October.
    8. Michael Dinerstein & Troy D. Smith, 2021. "Quantifying the Supply Response of Private Schools to Public Policies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(10), pages 3376-3417, October.
    9. 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.
    10. 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, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(1), pages 157-218.
    11. Bryan S. Graham, 2008. "Identifying Social Interactions Through Conditional Variance Restrictions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(3), pages 643-660, May.
    12. Michael Gilraine, 2020. "A Method for Disentangling Multiple Treatments from a Regression Discontinuity Design," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 38(4), pages 1267-1311.
    13. Caroline M. Hoxby, 2000. "The Effects of Class Size on Student Achievement: New Evidence from Population Variation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(4), pages 1239-1285.
    14. Nicola Bianchi, 2015. "The General Effects of Educational Expansion," Discussion Papers 15-008, Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
    15. Christopher Jepsen & Steven Rivkin, 2009. "Class Size Reduction and Student Achievement: The Potential Tradeoff between Teacher Quality and Class Size," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(1).
    16. Patrick Bayer & Fernando Ferreira & Robert McMillan, 2004. "Tiebout Sorting, Social Multipliers and the Demand for School Quality," NBER Working Papers 10871, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Nicola Bianchi, 2020. "The Indirect Effects of Educational Expansions: Evidence from a Large Enrollment Increase in University Majors," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 38(3), pages 767-804.
    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. Michael Gilraine & Hugh Macartney & Robert McMillan, 2018. "Estimating the Direct and Indirect Effects of Major Education Reforms," NBER Working Papers 24191, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Mike Gilraine & Hugh Macartney & Rob McMillan, 2018. "Education Reform in General Equilibrium: Evidence from California's Class Size Reduction," Working Papers tecipa-594, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    3. Figlio, D. & Karbownik, K. & Salvanes, K.G., 2016. "Education Research and Administrative Data," Handbook of the Economics of Education,, Elsevier.
    4. Stephen Gibbons & Sandra McNally & Martina Viarengo, 2018. "Does Additional Spending Help Urban Schools? An Evaluation Using Boundary Discontinuities," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 16(5), pages 1618-1668.
    5. Raj Chetty & John N. Friedman & Nathaniel Hilger & Emmanuel Saez & Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach & Danny Yagan, 2011. "How Does Your Kindergarten Classroom Affect Your Earnings? Evidence from Project Star," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(4), pages 1593-1660.
    6. de Gendre, Alexandra & Salamanca, Nicolás, 2020. "On the Mechanisms of Ability Peer Effects," IZA Discussion Papers 13938, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Maximilian Bach & Stephan Sievert, 2019. "Birth Cohort Size Variation and the Estimation of Class Size Effects," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1817, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    8. Schiltz, Fritz & Mazrekaj, Deni & Horn, Daniel & De Witte, Kristof, 2019. "Does it matter when your smartest peers leave your class? Evidence from Hungary," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 79-91.
    9. Jesús M. Carro & Pedro Gallardo, 2024. "Effect of class size on student achievement in the COVID‐19 “new normal”," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 76(2), pages 303-318, April.
    10. Masakazu Hojo, 2011. "Education Production Function and Class-Size Effects in Japanese Public Schools," Global COE Hi-Stat Discussion Paper Series gd11-194, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    11. Macartney, Hugh & Singleton, John D., 2018. "School boards and student segregation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 165-182.
    12. Andreas Ammermueller & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2006. "Peer Effects in European Primary Schools: Evidence from PIRLS," CEE Discussion Papers 0065, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE.
    13. Niklas Jakobsson & Mattias Persson & Mikael Svensson, 2013. "Class-size effects on adolescents' mental health and well-being in Swedish schools," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 248-263, July.
    14. Meghir, Costas & Rivkin, Steven, 2011. "Econometric Methods for Research in Education," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 1, pages 1-87, Elsevier.
    15. Kedagni, Desire & Krishna, Kala & Megalokonomou, Rigissa & Zhao, Yingyan, 2021. "Does class size matter? How, and at what cost?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    16. Vincent Boucher & Yann Bramoullé & Habiba Djebbari & Bernard Fortin, 2014. "Do Peers Affect Student Achievement? Evidence From Canada Using Group Size Variation," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(1), pages 91-109, January.
    17. Michael Dinerstein & Troy D. Smith, 2021. "Quantifying the Supply Response of Private Schools to Public Policies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(10), pages 3376-3417, October.
    18. Adrien Bouguen & Julien Grenet & Marc Gurgand, 2017. "Does class size influence student achievement?," Post-Print halshs-02522747, HAL.
    19. Tilley, J. Lucas, 2023. "School resources, peer inputs, and student outcomes in adult education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    20. Matthew M. Chingos & Kenneth A. Couch, 2013. "Class Size and Student Outcomes: Research and Policy Implications," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(2), pages 411-438, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Education Reform; Direct Effects; Indirect Effects; Sorting; Education Production; Class Size Reduction; Persistence; Differencing; Difference-in-Differences;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H40 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - General
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I22 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Educational Finance; Financial Aid

    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:tor:tecipa:tecipa-673. 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: RePEc Maintainer (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.