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What Impacts Can We Expect from School Spending Policy? Evidence from Evaluations in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • C. Kirabo Jackson
  • Claire L. Mackevicius

Abstract

We conduct meta-analysis on a comprehensive set of studies of the impacts of US K-12 public school spending on student outcomes—estimating average marginal impacts and heterogeneity across contexts. On average, a policy increasing spending by $1,000 per pupil for four years improves test scores by 0.0316σ and college-going by 2.8 pp. Moving beyond averages, we use estimates of heterogeneity and observable policy differences to produce informative probability distributions of policy effects. Effects are smaller for economically advantaged populations, marginal effects of capital spending are similar to noncapital, and effects are similar across baseline spending levels and geography. Confounding and publication biases are minimal.

Suggested Citation

  • C. Kirabo Jackson & Claire L. Mackevicius, 2024. "What Impacts Can We Expect from School Spending Policy? Evidence from Evaluations in the United States," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(1), pages 412-446, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aejapp:v:16:y:2024:i:1:p:412-46
    DOI: 10.1257/app.20220279
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Spreen, Thomas Luke & Wang, Ziyuan & Yang, Lang (Kate), 2025. "Industrial automation and local public goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 247(C).
    2. Danielle V. Handel & Eric A. Hanushek, 2024. "Contexts of Convenience: Generalizing from Published Evaluations of School Finance Policies," Evaluation Review, , vol. 48(3), pages 461-494, June.
    3. Kirill Borusyak & Matan Kolerman-Shemer, 2024. "Regression discontinuity aggregation, with an application to the union effects on inequality," Papers 2501.00428, arXiv.org.
    4. Umut Özek, 2025. "Does one plus one always equal two? Examining complementarities in educational interventions," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(1), pages 45-72, January.
    5. Rosenqvist, Olof & Sauermann, Jan, 2025. "The effects of increasing compensatory resource allocation on student achievement," Working Paper Series 2025:15, IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy.
    6. Chauvin, Juan Pablo, 2024. "Local Education Spending and Migration: Evidence from a Large Redistribution Program," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 13497, Inter-American Development Bank.
    7. Stephane Lavertu & Long Tran, 2025. "For‐profit milk in nonprofit cartons? The case of nonprofit charter schools subcontracting with for‐profit education management organizations," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 44(1), pages 236-265, January.
    8. Candelaria, Christopher A. & Fazlul, Ishtiaque & Koedel, Cory & Shores, Kenneth A., 2024. "Weighting for progressivity? An analysis of implicit tradeoffs associated with weighted student funding in Tennessee," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    9. Ferrando, Mery & Gille, Véronique, 2025. "Does the identity of leaders matter for education? Evidence from the first black governor in the US," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    10. Emma Duchini & Victor Lavy & Stephen Machin & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2025. "Personnel policy in public sector organizations: evidence from England's academy schools," CEP Discussion Papers dp2129, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    11. Thomas Goldring & Brian Jacob & Daniel Kreisman & Michael Ricks, 2024. "Loopholes and the Incidence of Public Services: Evidence from Funding Career & Technical Education," NBER Working Papers 32390, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Dietrichson, Jens & Klokker, Rasmus H., 2024. "Predicting preschool problems," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    13. Raj Chetty & Will S. Dobbie & Benjamin Goldman & Sonya Porter & Crystal Yang, 2024. "Changing Opportunity: Sociological Mechanisms Underlying Growing Class Gaps and Shrinking Race Gaps in Economic Mobility," NBER Working Papers 32697, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. John H.Y. Edwards, 2024. "Education Quality, Income Inequality, and Female Labor Force Participation in Brazil," Working Papers 2409, Tulane University, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H75 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Government: Health, Education, and Welfare
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I22 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Educational Finance; Financial Aid
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • I28 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Government Policy

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    1. Meta-Research in Economics

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