Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Discipline
Articles 1 - 22 of 22
Full-Text Articles in Education
The Decline Of Routine Tasks, Education Investments, And Intergenerational Mobility, Patrick Bennett, Kai Liu, Kjell Salvanes
The Decline Of Routine Tasks, Education Investments, And Intergenerational Mobility, Patrick Bennett, Kai Liu, Kjell Salvanes
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
How does a large structural change to the labor market affect education investments made at young ages? Exploiting differential exposure to the national decline in routine-task intensity across local labor markets, we show that the secular decline in routine tasks causes major shifts in education investments of high school students, where they invest less in vocational-trades education and increasingly invest in college education. Our results highlight that labor demand changes impact inequality in the next generation. Low-ability and low-SES students are most responsive to task-biased demand changes and, as a result, intergenerational mobility in college education increases.
Keep Me In, Coach: The Short- And Long-Term Effects Of Targeted Academic Coaching, Serena Canaan, Stefanie Fischer, Pierre Mouganie, Geoffrey C. Schnorr
Keep Me In, Coach: The Short- And Long-Term Effects Of Targeted Academic Coaching, Serena Canaan, Stefanie Fischer, Pierre Mouganie, Geoffrey C. Schnorr
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
To boost college graduation rates, policymakers often advocate for academic supports such as coaching or mentoring. Proactive and intensive coaching interventions are effective, but are costly and difficult to scale. We evaluate a relatively lower-cost group coaching program targeted at first-year college students placed on academic probation. Participants attend a workshop where coaches aim to normalize failure and improve self-confidence. Coaches also facilitate a process whereby participants reflect on their academic difficulties, devise solutions to address their challenges, and create an action plan. Participants then hold a one-time follow-up meeting with their coach or visit a campus resource. Using a …
Degrees Of Poverty: The Relationship Between Family Income Background And The Returns To Education, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein
Degrees Of Poverty: The Relationship Between Family Income Background And The Returns To Education, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Drawing on the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we document a startling empirical pattern: the career earnings premium from a four-year college degree (relative to a high school diploma) for persons from low-income backgrounds is considerably less than it is for those from higher-income backgrounds. For individuals whose family income in high school was above 1.85 times the poverty level, we estimate that career earnings for bachelor’s graduates are 136 percent higher than earnings for those whose education stopped at high school. However, for individuals whose family income during high school was below 1.85 times the poverty level, the career …
The Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On College Enrollment, Persistence, And Completion, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein, Marta Lachowska
The Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On College Enrollment, Persistence, And Completion, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein, Marta Lachowska
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
We estimate the effects on postsecondary education outcomes of the Kalamazoo Promise, a generous, place-based college scholarship. We identify Promise effects using difference-in-differences, comparing eligible to ineligible graduates before and after the Promise’s initiation. According to our estimates, the Promise significantly increases college enrollment, college credits attempted, and credential attainment. Stronger effects occur for women.
Propelled: The Effects Of Grants On Graduation, Earnings, And Welfare, Jeffrey T. Denning, Benjamin M. Marx, Lesley J. Turner
Propelled: The Effects Of Grants On Graduation, Earnings, And Welfare, Jeffrey T. Denning, Benjamin M. Marx, Lesley J. Turner
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
We estimate the effect of grant aid on poor college students’ attainment and earnings using student-level administrative data from four-year public colleges in Texas. To identify these effects, we exploit a discontinuity in grant generosity as a function of family income. Eligibility for the maximum Pell Grant significantly increases degree receipt and earnings beginning four years after entry. Within 10 years, imputed taxes on eligible students’ earnings gains fully recoup total government expenditures generated by initial eligibility. To clarify how these estimates relate to social welfare, we develop a general theoretical model and derive sufficient statistics for the welfare implications …
Born Under A Lucky Star: Financial Aid, College Completion, Labor Supply, And Credit Constraints, Jeffrey T. Denning
Born Under A Lucky Star: Financial Aid, College Completion, Labor Supply, And Credit Constraints, Jeffrey T. Denning
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Higher education has experienced many changes since the 1970s, including an increase in the price of college, an increase in student employment during college, a decrease in college completion rates, and an increase in time to degree. This paper ties these trends together by causally linking changes in financial aid with time to degree and student employment during college. I find that additional financial aid accelerates graduation for university seniors because they increase credits attempted and reduce earnings while in college. In reaching this finding, I use administrative education and earnings data to examine a discrete change in the amount …
The Merits Of Universal Scholarships: Benefit-Cost Evidence From The Kalamazoo Promise, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein, Marta Lachowska
The Merits Of Universal Scholarships: Benefit-Cost Evidence From The Kalamazoo Promise, Timothy J. Bartik, Brad J. Hershbein, Marta Lachowska
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
As higher education costs rise, many communities have begun to adopt their own financial aid strategy: place-based scholarships for students graduating from the local school district. In this paper, we examine the benefits and costs of the Kalamazoo Promise, one of the more universal and more generous place-based scholarships. Building upon estimates of the program's heterogeneous effects on degree attainment, scholarship cost data, and projections of future earnings by education, we examine the Promise’s benefit-cost ratios for students differentiated by income, race, and gender. Although the average rate of return of the program is 11 percent, rates of return vary …
Late For The Meeting: Gender, Peer Advising, And College Success, Jimmy R. Ellis, Seth Gershenson
Late For The Meeting: Gender, Peer Advising, And College Success, Jimmy R. Ellis, Seth Gershenson
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Many male and first-generation college-goers struggle in their first year of postsecondary education. Mentoring programs have been touted as a potential solution to help such students acclimate to college life, yet causal evidence on the impact of such programs, and the factors that influence participation in them, is scant. This study leverages a natural experiment in which peer advisors (PAs) were quasi-randomly assigned to first-year university students to show that 1) male students were significantly more likely to voluntarily meet with their assigned PA when the PA was also male and 2) these compliers were significantly more likely to persist …
Income-Tested College Financial Aid And Labor Disincentives, Rajeev Darolia
Income-Tested College Financial Aid And Labor Disincentives, Rajeev Darolia
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Working has become commonplace among college students; however, this activity can have unexpected financial consequences. Federal formulas implicitly tax the amount of financial aid students are eligible to receive by as much as 50 cents for each marginal dollar of income. This tax creates an incentive for college students to reduce income, though abstruse formulas and the timing of financial aid receipt are likely to limit responses. Using data from a national sample of financially independent college students in the United States, I do not find that students bunch below earnings protection thresholds in a manner that would indicate attempts …
The Production And Stock Of College Graduates For U.S. States, John V. Winters
The Production And Stock Of College Graduates For U.S. States, John V. Winters
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
The stock of human capital in an area is important for regional economic growth and development. However, highly educated workers are often quite mobile, and there is a concern that public investments in college graduates may not benefit the state if the college graduates leave the state after finishing their education. This paper examines the relationship between the production of college graduates from a state and the stock of college graduates residing in the state using microdata from the decennial census and American Community Survey. The relationship is examined across states and across cohorts within states. The descriptive analysis suggests …
Migration And Housing Price Effects Of Place-Based College Scholarships, Timothy J. Bartik, Nathan Sotherland
Migration And Housing Price Effects Of Place-Based College Scholarships, Timothy J. Bartik, Nathan Sotherland
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Place-based college scholarships, such as the Kalamazoo Promise, provide students who live in a particular place, and/or who attend a particular school district, with generous college scholarships. An important potential benefit from such “Promise programs” is their short-term effects on local economic development. Generous Promise scholarships provide an incentive for families to locate in a particular place, which may change migration patterns, and potentially boost local employment and housing prices. Using data from the American Community Survey, this paper estimates the average effects of eight relatively generous Promise programs on migration rates and housing prices in their local labor market. …
The Distribution Of College Graduate Debt, 1990 To 2008: A Decomposition Approach, Brad J. Hershbein, Kevin M. Hollenbeck
The Distribution Of College Graduate Debt, 1990 To 2008: A Decomposition Approach, Brad J. Hershbein, Kevin M. Hollenbeck
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Despite tremendous recent interest in the subject of student debt by both researchers and policy makers, little is known about how the distribution of college graduate debt has been evolving and what factors can explain it. We use National Postsecondary Student Aid Study data from 1990 through 2008 to document the evolution of college graduate debt profiles. We find that growth in debt over the 1990s was rapid and occurred throughout the distribution; during the 2000s, in contrast, debt grew appreciably only for the top quartile. Employing several decomposition techniques, we exploit the richness of the data to explain these …
A Second Look At Enrollment Changes After The Kalamazoo Promise, Brad J. Hershbein
A Second Look At Enrollment Changes After The Kalamazoo Promise, Brad J. Hershbein
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
While previous research has documented how the Kalamazoo Promise, the most prominent and generous place-based college scholarship program, increased enrollment in Kalamazoo Public Schools, this paper qualifies and quantifies the characteristics of students who were induced to enter—or stay—in the district. In particular, it analyzes the origins and destinations, socioeconomic composition, and school-level sorting behavior associated with student flows around the time of the Promise announcement. These dimensions are more subtle than changes in the volume of students or measures of their individual success, but they are equally important to understand for communities exploring the feasibility of place-based scholarships as …
The Short-Term Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On Student Outcomes, Timothy J. Bartik, Marta Lachowska
The Short-Term Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On Student Outcomes, Timothy J. Bartik, Marta Lachowska
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
In order to study whether college scholarships can be an effective tool in raising students’ performance in secondary school, we use one aspect of the Kalamazoo Promise that resembles a quasi-experiment. 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. This variation is arguably exogenous to unobserved student characteristics. We estimate the effects of this change by a set of “difference-in-differences” regressions where we compare the change in student outcomes in secondary school across time for different student “length of enrollment” groups. …
Do Bans On Affirmative Action Hurt Minority Students? Evidence From The Texas Top 10% Plan, Kalena E. Cortes
Do Bans On Affirmative Action Hurt Minority Students? Evidence From The Texas Top 10% Plan, Kalena E. Cortes
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
In light of the recent bans on affirmative action in higher education, this paper provides new evidence on the effects of alternative admissions policies on the persistence and college completion of minority students. I find that the change from affirmative action to the Top 10% Plan in Texas decreased both retention and graduation rates of lower-ranked minority students. Results show that both fall-to-fall freshmen retention and six-year college graduation of seconddecile minority students decreased, respectively, by 2.4 and 3.3 percentage points. The effect of the change in admissions policy was slightly larger for minority students in the third and lower …
Higher Education, The Health Care Industry, And Metropolitan Regional Economic Development: What Can "Eds & Meds" Do For The Economic Fortunes Of A Metro Area's Residents?, Timothy J. Bartik, George A. Erickcek
Higher Education, The Health Care Industry, And Metropolitan Regional Economic Development: What Can "Eds & Meds" Do For The Economic Fortunes Of A Metro Area's Residents?, Timothy J. Bartik, George A. Erickcek
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper examines the effects of expansions in higher educational institutions and the medical service industry on the economic development of a metropolitan area. This examination pulls together previous research and provides some new empirical evidence. We provide quantitative evidence of the magnitude of economic effects of higher education and medical service industries that occur through the mechanism of providing some export-base demand stimulus to a metropolitan economy. We also provide quantitative evidence on how much higher education institutions can boost a metropolitan economy through increasing the educational attainment of local residence. We estimate that medical service industries pay above …
Increasing The Economic Development Benefits Of Higher Education In Michigan, Timothy J. Bartik
Increasing The Economic Development Benefits Of Higher Education In Michigan, Timothy J. Bartik
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper considers how a state such as Michigan can increase the economic development benefits of higher education. Research evidence suggests that higher education increases local economic development principally by increasing the quality of the local workforce, and secondarily by increasing local innovative ideas. These economic development benefits of higher education can be increased by: 1) competent management of conventional economic development programs that focus on business attraction and retention; 2) policies that focus on increasing local job skills by educating the state's residents, as opposed to attracting in-migrants; 3) policies that address specific "market failures" in how higher education …
The Returns To Education And Basic Skills Training For Individuals With Poor Health Or Disability, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Jean Kimmel
The Returns To Education And Basic Skills Training For Individuals With Poor Health Or Disability, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Jean Kimmel
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper examines linkages between disability and health status and the returns to education and basic skills training. It bases analyses on two separate data sources: wave 3 from the 1993 panel of the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) and the 1992 National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS). The data sets have been used to estimate standard wage equations with education and basic skills training among the independent variables. The NALS data set allows us to control for prose, quantitative, and document literacy. The wage equations rely on Heckit corrections for labor force participation, and we stratify by sex. …
Using Administrative Data To Evaluate The Ohio Jobs Student Retention Program, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Jean Kimmel, Randall W. Eberts
Using Administrative Data To Evaluate The Ohio Jobs Student Retention Program, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Jean Kimmel, Randall W. Eberts
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper presents findings from a net impact evaluation of the Ohio JOBS Student Retention Program. The JOBS program, a component of the federal Aid to Families with Dependent Children (ADC) program, was required, in all states, for ADC recipients who met certain criteria. The Ohio JSRP was an activity pursued by some JOBS program clients in Ohio to fulfill their responsibilities in order to receive aid. The JSRP was a three-fold support program designed to facilitate entry to and success in programs of study at two-year community or technical colleges. We evaluated this state welfare policy while simultaneously dealing …
Seniority, External Labor Markets, And Faculty Pay, Byron W. Brown, Stephen A. Woodbury
Seniority, External Labor Markets, And Faculty Pay, Byron W. Brown, Stephen A. Woodbury
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
We estimate the returns to seniority (the wage-tenure profile) for university faculty, and the degree to which these returns respond to entry-level salaries (or opportunity wages) a relationship unexplored in work to date. Using data on faculty at a Big Ten university (ours), we estimate elasticities of senior-faculty salaries with respect to entry-level salaries, and find that these elasticities decline with seniority. The evidence both provides an explanation of faculty salary compression and suggests the importance of controlling for entry-level salaries in obtaining estimates of the returns to seniority.
Gender Differences In Faculty Turnover, Byron W. Brown, Stephen A. Woodbury
Gender Differences In Faculty Turnover, Byron W. Brown, Stephen A. Woodbury
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Over the last 15 to 20 years, colleges and universities have paid increasing attention to attracting and retaining faculty women. The rate of progress of women in academe has nevertheless been painfully slow. For example, statistics on economists collected and published by the American Economic Association (Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession 1994) suggest that in recent years, about 20 percent of Economics assistant professors in graduate Ph.D.-granting departments were women, about 10 percent of associate professors were women, and under 5 percent of full professors were women. The percentage of new assistant professors who are …
Postsecondary Education As Triage: Returns To Academic And Technical Programs, Kevin M. Hollenbeck
Postsecondary Education As Triage: Returns To Academic And Technical Programs, Kevin M. Hollenbeck
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper examines the labor market outcomes of individuals with various types of postsecondary educational experiences. In particular, it examines differences between students who have pursued technical education programs from those who have pursued academic programs and from those individuals who have not pursued any type of postsecondary education. Empirical evidence is presented concerning the relationship between economic outcomes and grades earned and the degree to which the labor market rewards credentials. Wage and earnings models yield different structural parameter estimates when based on the three different populations. The differences are most dramatic for high school background effects and for …