Do more decentralized local governments do better? an evaluation of the 2001 decentralization reform in Colombia

Darwin Cortés

No 7182, Documentos de Trabajo from Universidad del Rosario

Abstract: In this paper I evaluate the impact of the 2001 decentralization reform in Colombia. I use data from Colombia's municipalities. I look at the effect of the 2001 reform on enrolment in pre-college schools. While all municipalities received earnmarked national transfers, withthe reform some of then now have more responsabilities to provide education (deeper decen-tralization) than others. Particulary important, the reform entitle the more decentralizedmunicipalities to sign subsidy contracts with private school. Departments (the regional gov-ernments) are entitle to sign this type of contracts for the less decentralized municipalities.Since the rule for municipalities to receive more responsabilities follows and exogenous popu-lation threshold, I can implement Regression Discontinuity Design. Enrolment is measuredthrough two variables: the number of students enroled in public schools and the number of subsidized students enroled in private schools. Results sugest that more decentralized mu-nicipalities subsidize more students in private schools. The difference is significant at all thelevels of pre-college school for the period 2004-2006. In 2005, the difference accounts for20% of enrolment in private schools and 3% of population of school age. Besides, there are not significant differences among municipalities regarding enrolment in public schools.

Keywords: Decentralization; Education Reform; Quasi-experiments and Colombia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C21 H52 H72 I22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 41
Date: 2010-05-31
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-pbe and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:col:000092:007182

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