This paper estimates the returns to education in Arkansas-one of the last states to extend compulsory schooling-using ACS 2023 data and the 1987 Compulsory Schooling Law (CSL) reform as an instrument. OLS estimates imply returns of 9.5-10.4 percent per year of schooling. The CSL reform increased...

This paper replicates and extends the evidence on the lifetime effects of school starting age on earnings by Fredriksson and Öckert (2014) for Sweden. Using German data for individuals born between 1945 and 1965, we examine a more rigid system of ability tracking in secondary education, a...

"This paper combines ten years of idiosyncratic variation in school closure dates for all secondary schools in England with administrative records of educational and criminal trajectories linked at the individual level to study the impact of the school schedule on the dynamics of youth crime....

Personality traits, preferences, and attitudes significantly influence labor market outcomes, and these non-cognitive skills are shaped by the social environment. While curriculum interventions can impact these skills, the effect of compulsory education on noncognitive skills is less well...

Personality traits, preferences, and attitudes significantly influence labor market outcomes, and these non-cognitive skills are shaped by the social environment. While curriculum interventions can impact these skills, the effect of compulsory education on non-cognitive skills is less well...

Millions of children worldwide remain out of school due to the high costs of reaching them and a shortage of qualified teachers. Can ICT-based instruction help close this gap and deliver the long-term benefits of traditional schooling? This paper provides causal evidence on the long-term...

This paper develops and estimates a dynamic model, which integrates value‐added and school‐choice models, to evaluate grade‐by‐grade and cumulative impacts of the Mexican Prospera conditional cash transfer (CCT) program on educational achievement. The empirical application advances the...

This paper combines ten years of idiosyncratic variation in school closure dates for all secondary schools in England with administrative records of educational and criminal trajectories linked at the individual level to study the impact of the school schedule on the dynamics of youth crime....

This study provides a policy evaluation of laws allowing early school enrollment of children, i.e., enrollment before the official school starting age. It investigates the effects of early enrollment on educational attainment, wages and employment. While the school starting age is usually...

Given the critical role of neurocognitive development in early life, this study assesses how racial differences in early-life circumstances are collectively and individually associated with racial disparities in late-life cognition. Leveraging uniquely rich information on life history from the...

Excessive work among adolescents may compromise educational development. Without home appliances, household work can take over 50 h a week and an additional 30 h when an infant is present. School-aged girls are often tasked with doing laundry, which is time-consuming and inflexible without a...

This study provides a policy evaluation of laws allowing early school enrollment of children, i.e., enrollment before the official school starting age. It investigates the effects of early enrollment on educational attainment, wages and employment. While the school starting age is usually...

This paper investigates the impact of hurricanes on school attendance in Jamaica from 1892 to 1942, a period marked by significant natural disasters, including four category two hurricanes. By integrating monthly school attendance data from the fourteen Jamaican parishes with assessments of...

This paper explores the intergenerational effects of the 1997 compulsory schooling reform in Turkey, which extended compulsory schooling from five to eight years, on the developmental outcomes of children aged 36 to 59 months. We draw upon data from the 2018 Turkey Demographic and Health Survey,...

Covering the full population of applicants to the Jamaican Conditional Cash Transfer Program (PATH), we explore whether receiving PATH since childhood altered the academic gains from attending a more preferred public secondary school. To uncover causal associations, we implement a double...

Given the critical role of neurocognitive development in early life, this study assesses how racial differences in early-life circumstances are collectively and individually associated with racial disparities in late-life cognition. Leveraging uniquely rich information on life history from the...

This paper replicates and extends the evidence on the lifetime effects of school starting age on earnings by Fredriksson and Öckert (2014) for Sweden. Using German data for individuals born between 1945 and 1965, we examine a more rigid system of ability tracking in secondary education, a...

This fact sheet focuses on the duration of compulsory education/training in Europe. It highlights the starting and leaving ages and distinguishes the notions of full-time and part-time compulsory education/training. The information is available for 39 European education systems covering 37...

This fact sheet focuses on the duration of compulsory education/training in Europe. It highlights the starting and leaving ages and distinguishes the notions of full-time and part-time compulsory education/training. The information is available for 39 European education systems covering 37...

We study the effects of school starting age on siblings' infant health. In Spain, children born in December start school a year earlier than those born the following January, despite being essentially the same age. We follow a regression discontinuity design to compare the health at birth of the...

The standard economic model of occupational choice following a basic Roy model emphasizes individual selection and comparative advantage, but the sources of comparative advantage are not well understood. We employ a unique combination of Dutch survey and registry data that links math and...

We examine the effects of maternal exposure to the Taliban rule in Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001 on children’s school attendance and years of education. By leveraging the geographical variations resulting from the Taliban’s unforeseen expansion and subsequent collapse, we find that...

This study employs Chilean administrative data to investigate the impact of School Starting Age (SSA) on the characteristics of students' initial enrolled schools. Employing minimum age requirements and an RD-design to mitigate endogeneity concerns, we identify benefits linked to commencing...

This paper examines the marriage market returns of female education in Egypt by exploiting a very direct measure of returns: bride price, a significant amount of resources transferred by the groom at the time of marriage. Identification issues are addressed by exploiting a school reform that...

We examine the mortality effects of a 1947 school reform in Japan, which extended compulsory schooling from primary to secondary school by as much as 3 years. The abolition of secondary school fees also indicates that those affected by the reform likely came from disadvantaged families who could...

This paper posits marriage market returns as a contributing factor to stagnant female labor force participation despite increasing female education. The paper examines the marriage market returns of female education by exploiting a very direct measure of returns: bride price, a significant...

As the COVID-19 pandemic led to a historic and widespread shutdown of schools across the world, including in Sub-Saharan Africa, there were general concerns that girls would be disproportionately affected. This study analyzes the effects of the pandemic on the school attendance of adolescent...

The standard economic model of occupational choice following a basic Roy model emphasizes individual selection and comparative advantage, but the sources of comparative advantage are not well understood. We employ a unique combination of Dutch survey and registry data that links math and...

We assess the impact of the 2010 Haiti earthquake on children’s nutrition and education. We combine geo-coded shaking intensity data with four waves of the Haiti Demographic Health Survey, two administered before and two after the earthquake. We find lasting negative impacts of the earthquake...