Beyond the Classroom: Using Title IX to Measure the Return to High School Sports

Betsey Stevenson

No 15728, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Between 1972 and 1978 U.S. high schools rapidly increased their female athletic participation rates--to approximately the same level as their male athletic participation rates--in order to comply with Title IX, a policy change that provides a unique quasi-experiment in female athletic participation. This paper examines the causal implications of this expansion in female sports participation by using variation in the level of boys' athletic participation across states before Title IX to instrument for the change in girls' athletic participation. Analysis of differences in outcomes across states in changes between pre- and post-cohorts reveals that a 10-percentage point rise in state-level female sports participation generates a 1 percentage point increase in female college attendance and a 1 to 2 percentage point rise in female labor force participation. Furthermore, greater opportunities to play sports leads to greater female participation in previously male-dominated occupations, particularly in high-skill occupations.

JEL-codes: I2 I21 I28 J16 J18 J21 J22 J24 J44 K3 K36 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-lab and nep-spo
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Published as Betsey Stevenson, 2010. "Beyond the Classroom: Using Title IX to Measure the Return to High School Sports," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 92(2), pages 284-301, 08.

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Journal Article: Beyond the Classroom: Using Title IX to Measure the Return to High School Sports (2010)
Working Paper: Beyond the Classroom: Using Title IX to Measure the Return to High School Sports (2010)
Working Paper: Beyond the classroom: using Title IX to measure the return to high school sports (2006)
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