Public Education Inequality and Intergenerational Mobility

Angela Zheng and James Graham

American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, 2022, vol. 14, issue 3, 250-82

Abstract: Public school funding depends heavily on local property tax revenue. Consequently, low-income households have limited access to quality education in neighborhoods with high house prices. In a dynamic life-cycle model with neighborhood choice and endogenous local school quality, we show that this property tax funding mechanism reduces intergenerational mobility and accounts for the spatial correlation between house prices and mobility. A housing voucher experiment improves access to schools, with benefits that can last for multiple generations. Additionally, a policy that redistributes property tax revenues equally across schools improves mobility and welfare. However, the benefits can take generations to be realized.

JEL-codes: H71 H75 I21 I22 J62 R23 R31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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DOI: 10.1257/mac.20180466

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