The economic determinants of truancy

Simon Burgess (), Karen Gardiner and Carol Propper

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: Truancy is often seen as irrational behaviour on the part of school age youth. This paper takes the opposite view and models truancy as the solution to a time allocation problem in which youths derive current returns from activities that reduce time spent at school. The model is estimated using a US panel dataset, the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979, and the estimation allows for the possible endogeneity of returns from these competing activities. The results show that truancy is a function of the estimated economic returns from work, crime and school.

Keywords: truancy; returns to education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N0 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 46 pages
Date: 2002-09
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/6379/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: The Economic Determinants of Truancy (2002)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:6379

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