{"title":"Saving the American Dream? Education Policies in Spatial General Equilibrium","authors":"Fabian Eckert, Tatjana Kleineberg","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3800943","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Children's education and economic opportunities differ substantially across US neighborhoods. This paper develops and estimates a spatial equilibrium model that links children's education outcomes to their childhood location. Two endogenous factors determine education choices in each location: local education quality and local labor market access. This paper estimates the model with US county-level data and studies the effects of a school funding equalization on education outcomes and social mobility. The reform's direct effects improve education outcomes among children from low-skill families. However, the effects are weaker in spatial general equilibrium because average returns to education decline and residential and educational choices of low-skill families shift them toward locations with lower education quality.","PeriodicalId":196465,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution (Topic)","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-03-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"9","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"ERN: Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution (Topic)","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3800943","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 9
Abstract
Children's education and economic opportunities differ substantially across US neighborhoods. This paper develops and estimates a spatial equilibrium model that links children's education outcomes to their childhood location. Two endogenous factors determine education choices in each location: local education quality and local labor market access. This paper estimates the model with US county-level data and studies the effects of a school funding equalization on education outcomes and social mobility. The reform's direct effects improve education outcomes among children from low-skill families. However, the effects are weaker in spatial general equilibrium because average returns to education decline and residential and educational choices of low-skill families shift them toward locations with lower education quality.