IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp5564.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Returns to Compulsory Schooling in Britain: Evidence from a Bayesian Fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Chib, Siddhartha

    (Washington University, St. Louis)

  • Jacobi, Liana

    (University of Melbourne)

Abstract

In this paper we reevaluate the returns to education based on the increase in the compulsory schooling age from 14 to 15 in the UK in 1947. We provide a Bayesian fuzzy regression discontinuity approach to infer the effect on earnings for a subset of subjects who turned 14 in a narrow window around the policy change and whose schooling was affected by the policy change. Our approach and our results are quite different from previous work that has focused on large sets of cohorts and 2SLS based approaches and has reported positive earnings and wage effects of 5% and above. Our empirical analysis, using data from the UK General Household Surveys, yields considerably lower earnings and wage effects for the additional year of compulsory schooling than previous work. These findings are consistent with the implementation of the policy change that affected students at the lower end of the schooling distribution and did not lead students to acquire additional qualifications. The results add further evidence to a number of recent studies that have found no effect from this policy change on socio-economic outcomes correlated with earnings.

Suggested Citation

  • Chib, Siddhartha & Jacobi, Liana, 2011. "Returns to Compulsory Schooling in Britain: Evidence from a Bayesian Fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Analysis," IZA Discussion Papers 5564, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5564
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp5564.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Philip Oreopoulos, 2006. "Estimating Average and Local Average Treatment Effects of Education when Compulsory Schooling Laws Really Matter," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 152-175, March.
    2. Jörn-Steffen Pischke & Till von Wachter, 2008. "Zero Returns to Compulsory Schooling in Germany: Evidence and Interpretation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 592-598, August.
    3. Harmon, Colm & Walker, Ian, 1995. "Estimates of the Economic Return to Schooling for the United Kingdom," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1278-1286, December.
    4. Damon Clark & Heather Royer, 2010. "The Effect of Education on Adult Health and Mortality: Evidence from Britain," NBER Working Papers 16013, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Lindeboom, Maarten & Llena-Nozal, Ana & van der Klaauw, Bas, 2009. "Parental education and child health: Evidence from a schooling reform," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 109-131, January.
    6. Daron Acemoglu & Joshua Angrist, 2001. "How Large Are Human Capital Externalities? Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2000, Volume 15, pages 9-74, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Julien Grenet, 2013. "Is Extending Compulsory Schooling Alone Enough to Raise Earnings? Evidence from French and British Compulsory Schooling Laws," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 115(1), pages 176-210, January.
    8. Harmon, Colm & Walker, Ian, 1999. "The marginal and average returns to schooling in the UK," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(4-6), pages 879-887, April.
    9. Chib, Siddhartha, 2007. "Analysis of treatment response data without the joint distribution of potential outcomes," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 140(2), pages 401-412, October.
    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. Hart, Robert A & Moro, Mirko & Roberts, J Elizabeth, 2012. "Date of birth, family background, and the 11 plus exam: short- and long-term consequences of the 1944 secondary education reforms in England and W ales," Stirling Economics Discussion Papers 2012-10, University of Stirling, Division of Economics.

    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. Paul J. Devereux & Robert A. Hart, 2010. "Forced to be Rich? Returns to Compulsory Schooling in Britain," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 120(549), pages 1345-1364, December.
    2. Seeun Jung, 2015. "Does education affect risk aversion? Evidence from the British education reform," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(28), pages 2924-2938, June.
    3. Tony Beatton & Michael P. Kidd & Matteo Sandi, 2020. "School indiscipline and crime," CEP Discussion Papers dp1727, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    4. Cummins, Neil, 2022. "The Causal Effects of Education on Age at Marriage and Marital Fertility," CEPR Discussion Papers 17398, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Seeun Jung, 2014. "Does Education Affect Risk Aversion?: Evidence from the 1973 British Education Reform," PSE Working Papers halshs-00967229, HAL.
    6. Dolton, Peter & Sandi, Matteo, 2017. "Returning to returns: Revisiting the British education evidence," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 87-104.
    7. de New, Sonja C. & Schurer, Stefanie & Sulzmaier, Dominique, 2021. "Gender differences in the lifecycle benefits of compulsory schooling policies," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    8. Daniel A. Kamhöfer & Hendrik Schmitz, 2013. "Analyzing Zero Returns to Education in Germany – Heterogeneous Eff ects and Skill Formation," Ruhr Economic Papers 0446, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    9. Martin Fischer & Martin Karlsson & Therese Nilsson & Nina Schwarz, 2020. "The Long-Term Effects of Long Terms – Compulsory Schooling Reforms in Sweden," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 18(6), pages 2776-2823.
    10. Mario Fiorini & Katrien Stevens, 2021. "Scrutinizing the Monotonicity Assumption in IV and fuzzy RD designs," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(6), pages 1475-1526, December.
    11. Jürges, Hendrik & Reinhold, Steffen & Salm, Martin, 2011. "Does schooling affect health behavior? Evidence from the educational expansion in Western Germany," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 862-872, October.
    12. Timo Hener & Tanya Wilson, 2018. "Marital Age Gaps and Educational Homogamy – Evidence from a Compulsory Schooling Reform in the UK," ifo Working Paper Series 256, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    13. repec:zbw:rwirep:0446 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Melvin Stephens Jr. & Dou-Yan Yang, 2014. "Compulsory Education and the Benefits of Schooling," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(6), pages 1777-1792, June.
    15. Kamhöfer, Daniel & Schmitz, Hendrik, 2013. "Analyzing Zero Returns to Education in Germany: Heterogeneous Effects and Skill Formation," VfS Annual Conference 2013 (Duesseldorf): Competition Policy and Regulation in a Global Economic Order 79910, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    16. Adam M. Lavecchia & Heidi Liu & Philip Oreopoulos, 2014. "Behavioral Economics of Education: Progress and Possibilities," NBER Working Papers 20609, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Gathmann, Christina & Jürges, Hendrik & Reinhold, Steffen, 2015. "Compulsory schooling reforms, education and mortality in twentieth century Europe," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 74-82.
    18. Janke, Katharina & Johnston, David W. & Propper, Carol & Shields, Michael A., 2020. "The causal effect of education on chronic health conditions in the UK," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    19. Janke, Katharina & Johnston, David W. & Propper, Carol & Shields, Michael A., 2018. "The Causal Effect of Education on Chronic Health Conditions," IZA Discussion Papers 11353, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Franziska Hampf, 2019. "The Effect of Compulsory Schooling on Skills: Evidence from a Reform in Germany," ifo Working Paper Series 313, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    21. Siedler, Thomas, 2007. "Schooling and Citizenship: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Reforms," IZA Discussion Papers 2573, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Bayesian inference; causal effects; imperfect compliance; natural experiment; principal stratification; regression discontinuity; returns to schooling;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C11 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Bayesian Analysis: General
    • C21 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Cross-Sectional Models; Spatial Models; Treatment Effect Models
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education

    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:iza:izadps:dp5564. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.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.