Crime Exposure and Educational Outcomes in Mexico. (Violencia y desempeño académico en México)

Pedro Paulo Orraca-Romano ()
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Pedro Paulo Orraca-Romano: Departamento de Estudios Económicos, El Colegio de la Frontera Norte. México.

Ensayos Revista de Economia, 2018, vol. XXXVII, issue 2, 177-212

Abstract: Driven by drug-related crimes, homicide levels in Mexico have dramatically increased since 2007. This study examines the effect of students’ exposure to crime on educational outcomes in Mexico. Using school-level data, a panel of the country’s elementary and secondary schools is constructed to analyze the effect of local homicides on standardized test scores and grade failure rates. The results show that a one-unit increase in the homicide rate per 10,000 inhabitants is associated with a reduction in school-level test scores between 0.0035 and 0.0142 standard deviations, this is likely being driven by effects of individual test scores and by compositional changes in the student body. Additionally, a rise in the homicide rate is also associated with an increase in the grade failure rate. It is proposed that the negative effects of crime exposure are partly due to a reduction of the number of contact hours, and students not compensating for this, by studying more outside of school. Exposure to homicides has potentially long-term consequences since it may affect educational achievement levels and future income flow.

Keywords: Crime; Academic Performance; Homicides; Mexico (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H49 I25 O12 O54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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