Education inputs, student performance and school finance reform in Michigan

Latika Chaudhary

Economics of Education Review, 2009, vol. 28, issue 1, 90-98

Abstract: This paper estimates the impact of the Michigan school finance reform, Proposal A, on education inputs and test scores. Using a difference-in-difference estimation strategy, I find that school districts in Michigan used the increase in educational spending generated through Proposal A to increase teacher salaries and reduce class size to a smaller extent. Then, using the foundation allowance created by Proposal A as an instrument, I estimate the causal effect of increased spending on 4th and 7th grade math scores for two test measures - a scaled score and a percent satisfactory measure - and find positive effects of increased spending on 4th grade test scores. A 60% increase in spending increases the percent satisfactory score by one standard deviation. The positive impact of expenditures on test performance seems largely due to higher teacher salaries.

Keywords: Analysis; of; education; finance; School; finance; reform; Educational; economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272-7757(08)00051-4
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecoedu:v:28:y:2009:i:1:p:90-98

Access Statistics for this article

Economics of Education Review is currently edited by E. Cohn

More articles in Economics of Education Review from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().