Testing the Internal Validity of Compulsory School Reforms as Instrument for Years of Schooling

Quaderni - Working Paper DSE N° 911

28 Pages Posted: 31 Oct 2013

See all articles by Giorgio Brunello

Giorgio Brunello

University of Padua - Department of Economics; CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute for Economic Research); Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

Margherita Fort

University of Bologna; Ifo Institute, CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute), Ifo Institute; IZA

Guglielmo Weber

University of Padua - Department of Economics; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS)

Christoph Weiss

European Union - European Investment Bank

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: October 29, 2013

Abstract

In the large empirical literature that investigates the causal effects of education on outcomes such as health, wages and crime, it is customary to measure education with years of schooling, and to identify these effects using the exogenous variation provided by school reforms increasing compulsory education and minimum school leaving age. If these reforms are correlated to changes in school quality, and school quality is an omitted variable, this identification strategy may fail. We test whether this is the case by using the information provided by two distinct test scores on mathematics and reading and find that we cannot reject the internal validity of this popular identification strategy.

Keywords: human capital, instrumental variables, nested models

JEL Classification: C26, I2

Suggested Citation

Brunello, Giorgio and Fort, Margherita and Weber, Guglielmo and Weiss, Christoph, Testing the Internal Validity of Compulsory School Reforms as Instrument for Years of Schooling (October 29, 2013). Quaderni - Working Paper DSE N° 911, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2346850 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2346850

Giorgio Brunello (Contact Author)

University of Padua - Department of Economics ( email )

via Del Santo 33
35121 Padova
Italy
+39 049 827 4223 (Phone)
+39 049 827 4221 (Fax)

CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute for Economic Research)

Poschinger Str. 5
Munich, DE-81679
Germany

Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Margherita Fort

University of Bologna ( email )

Piazza Scaravilli 2
Bologna, 40100
Italy

Ifo Institute, CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute), Ifo Institute ( email )

Poschinger Str. 5
Munich
Germany

IZA ( email )

Guglielmo Weber

University of Padua - Department of Economics ( email )

via Del Santo 33
Padova, 35123
Italy
+39 049 827 4271 (Phone)
+39 049 827 4221 (Fax)

Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

London
United Kingdom

Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) ( email )

7 Ridgmount Street
London, WC1E 7AE
United Kingdom

Christoph Weiss

European Union - European Investment Bank ( email )

98-100 Boulevard Konrad Adenauer
L-2950
Luxembourg

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