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Do a Few Months of Compulsory Schooling Matter? The Education and Labour Market Impact of School Leaving Rules

Author

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  • Del Bono, Emilia

    () (ISER, University of Essex)

  • Galindo-Rueda, Fernando

    () (Office of National Statistics)

Abstract

This paper contributes to the understanding of how compulsory schooling regulations affect educational attainment and subsequent labour market outcomes. It uses valuable information from a natural experiment driven by rules that allow for variation in legal dropout dates. Since the school leaving rule bites in the middle of a school year cohort, our identification approach is immune to other relative age/peer effects. Information on the precise month of birth enables us to show that students compelled to stay on in education as a result of this compulsory school leaving rule attain higher qualification levels and see their participation and employment probability as adults enhanced. We show that the estimated genuine impact of attaining an academic qualification on participation and employment is always statistically significant, in particular for women, although IV coefficients are usually below OLS estimates.

Suggested Citation

  • Del Bono, Emilia & Galindo-Rueda, Fernando, 2004. "Do a Few Months of Compulsory Schooling Matter? The Education and Labour Market Impact of School Leaving Rules," IZA Discussion Papers 1233, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1233
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Arnaud Chevalier & Colm Harmon & Ian Walker & Yu Zhu, 2004. "Does Education Raise Productivity, or Just Reflect it?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(499), pages 499-517, November.
    2. Richard Blundell & Lorraine Dearden & Barbara Sianesi, 2003. "Evaluating the impact of education on earnings in the UK: Models, methods and results from the NCDS," IFS Working Papers W03/20, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    3. John Bound & David A. Jaeger, 1996. "On the Validity of Season of Birth as an Instrument in Wage Equations: A Comment on Angrist & Krueger's "Does Compulsory School Attendance Affect Scho," NBER Working Papers 5835, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Arnaud Chevalier, 2004. "Parental Education and Childs Education: A Natural Experiment," CEE Discussion Papers 0040, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE.
    5. Andrew Chesher, 2005. "Nonparametric Identification under Discrete Variation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(5), pages 1525-1550, September.
    6. Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2004. "The Impact of the School Year on Student Performance and Earnings: Evidence from the German short school years," CEE Discussion Papers 0034, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE.
    7. Plug, Erik J. S., 2001. "Season of birth, schooling and earnings," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 22(5), pages 641-660, October.
    8. Joshua D. Angrist & Alan B. Keueger, 1991. "Does Compulsory School Attendance Affect Schooling and Earnings?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 106(4), pages 979-1014.
    9. Kevin Milligan & Enrico Moretti & Philip Oreopoulos, 2003. "Does Education Improve Citizenship? Evidence from the U.S. and the U.K," NBER Working Papers 9584, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Dearden, Lorraine, 1999. "The effects of families and ability on men's education and earnings in Britain1," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(4), pages 551-567, November.
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    Cited by:

    1. Leigh, Andrew & Ryan, Chris, 2008. "Estimating returns to education using different natural experiment techniques," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 149-160, April.
    2. Puhani, Patrick A. & Weber, Andrea Maria, 2005. "Does the early bird catch the worm? Instrumental variable estimates of educational effects of age of school entry in Germany," Darmstadt Discussion Papers in Economics 151, Darmstadt University of Technology, Department of Law and Economics.
    3. Fertig, Michael & Kluve, Jochen, 2005. "The Effect of Age at School Entry on Educational Attainment in Germany," IZA Discussion Papers 1507, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    4. Erich Battistin & Barbara Sianesi, 2006. "Misreported schooling and returns to education: evidence from the UK," CeMMAP working papers CWP07/06, Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    5. repec:eee:labeco:v:48:y:2017:i:c:p:87-104 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Dickson, Matt & Smith, Sarah, 2011. "What determines the return to education: An extra year or a hurdle cleared?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 1167-1176.
    7. William Collier & Javier Valbuena & Yu Zhu, 2011. "What Determines Post-Compulsory Educational Choice? Evidence from the Longitudinal Survey of Young People in England," Studies in Economics 1112, School of Economics, University of Kent.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    school leaving rules; instrumental variables; education; participation; employment;

    JEL classification:

    • I2 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education
    • C13 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Estimation: General
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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