Education Commons^™

Is College The New High School? Evidence From Vacancy Postings, Brad Hershbein

Brad J. Hershbein

Do firms demand more skilled workers in a slack labor market? We use a new database of job vacancy postings, containing a near-universe of electronic posts in U.S. metro areas, collected by the firm Burning Glass over the period 2010-2013. We find evidence of upskilling – firms demanding more skilled workers – when the local unemployment rate is higher, i.e., in places where the recovery following the Great Recession was slower. Our estimates imply that firms demand three-quarters of a year more schooling on average in a large recession compared to a boom. We find that at least two-thirds of …

Longer-Term Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise: College Enrollment, Persistence, And Completion, Brad Hershbein

Brad J. Hershbein

This project will examine the effects of the Kalamazoo Promise on college enrollment, persistence, and completion using merged administrative data sources. The study will employ two approaches for identification: (1) differences-in-differences between eligible and non-eligible students before and after the Promise with and without inverse-probability treatment weights, and (2) propensity score matching of students from neighboring school districts. The study will explore standard heterogeneous treatments by gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status as well as by high school grades and standardized test scores. The study will aim to characterize how the distribution of high school graduates attending college changed as well …

The Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On Post-Secondary Educational Attainment: Implications For The Benefits And Costs Of Generous And Universal College Subsidies, Marta Lachowska, Timothy Bartik, Brad Hershbein

Brad J. Hershbein

In order to study whether universal college scholarships can reduce inequality in education, we study one aspect of the Kalamazoo Promise that resembles a “natural experiment.” We use the fact that the surprise announcement of the scholarship created a large change in expected college tuition costs that varied across different groups of students based on past enrollment decisions. Using a differences-in-differences analysis, we compare the outcomes of Promise-eligible students to ineligible students, before and after the Promise. Outcomes studied include college enrollment, whether the student has obtained a college degree, and after-college earnings. We use the economical and racial diversity …

A National Assessment Of The Effectiveness Of Publicly Funded Pre-Kindergarten, Brad J. Hershbein, Timothy J. Bartik

Brad J. Hershbein