This paper titled Schooling and Labour Market Consequences of School Construction in Indonesia: Evidence from an Unusual Policy Experiment was published in the American Economic Review issue of September 2001 and is one of Esther Duflo’s first papers and received wide attention. It studies the largest school construction program in record, undertaken by the Indonesian government between the years 1973 and 1978. It led to the construction of 61,000 primary schools affording one primary school per 1000 children. The program led to an average increase of .12 to .19 years of education as well as an increase in wages of 1.5 to 2.7 percent. The economic returns to education ranges from 6.8 to 10.6 percent.
I will highlight the key distinguishing features of the paper and outline its contributions to the field of evaluation in the design and scope section. The key methodologies will be discussed with attempts to draw comparison with contemporary practices. I will conclude by outlining some of the policy implications derived from the findings of the paper.
Design and Scope
• Quasi Experiment: This study creatively exploits a dramatic policy shift in Indonesia to study the effect of building schools on education and earnings. While it isn’t an experiment, the magnitude and design of the intervention creates conditions that qualify as a semi-experiment. The selection criteria of the locations for school construction based on enrolment rates create a natural comparison group. The use of quasi experiments finds mention in a 2004 paper as a “newer” research tool in the economics of education that has been used in studies on investments in education and infrastructure ( Patrino and Psachropoulus, 2004)
• Large scale Intervention: The magna...
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...tion because of outward migration of individuals educated in the local schools, decentralisation of school finances could lead to a decline in the public financing of education (Duflo 2004).
Conclusion
While classical empirical question of the causal effect of schooling on wages has been a key topic in labour economics, Esther Duflo in this paper has examined closely the challenge that arises when educational attainment is not exogenously allocated across individuals as family concerns, political processes act as influencers. Esther’s skill in strongly attributing the results of educational attainment to school construction through the use of specific estimators remains one of the successes of the paper. In conclusion, this paper is representative of the intellectual prowess and rigour that Esther Duflo has since contributed to the field of development economics.
Thomas Jefferson was a man who believed that all American citizens need to be educated so that they may exercise their rights. He saw public education as essential to a democracy. One proposal he made for public education would guarantee that all children could attend public schools for three years. However, much like other early school reforms, this proposal received much rejection and was never brought into being. Despite this rejection, Jefferson still believed that America needed public education. Eventually, he opened the University of Virginia. Even though his bills and proposals to benefit public education never saw the light of day, he still made many contributions to public education by providing the foundation on how a democracy should handle educating its
Hungerford, L., & Wassmer, W. (2004). K-12 Education in the U.S. Economy. Its impact on Economic Development, earnings and housing values. National Education Association. 1(3): 1-58.
[1] “Table 160, Summary of expenditures for public elementary and secondary education, by purpose: 1919-20 to 199-2000,” Digest of Education Statistics 2002, National Center for Education and Statistics, U.S. Department of Education.
Education is fundamental in today’s society. It has become a sought after medium for attaining success. Many careers have set specific educational requirements for a person to even be considered for employment. The education that one receives can be achieved through different types of institutes. Many parents face the conundrum of sending their children to the right institution that will aid in their child’s future success. The choices seem to be in abundance but many people find themselves limited to a short list of obtainable institutions. The parents have a great deal of things that need to be thought through. This may require factors that have to be considered. Some of the factors include the following: curriculum, class sizes, cost and school’s quality but these are some questions that stand out. Does the type of school really help performance? Are there factors that hinder one type of institution from thriving? These decisions are crucial and, for the most part, will determine the type of institution the child will receive his or hers knowledge from.
There are many other areas around the United States where urban schools suffer from lack of funding. In many of America...
School funding has always been a debatable topic. Although school funding needs to be increased, there is no proof of academic achievement (Hanushek). Academic researchers have sought to answer the questions of whether education expenditures are correlated with student performance(Hanushek). Hanushek has found that there is no proof of academic achievement towards funding the schools(Hanushek). It depends on how the money is spent, not on how much money is spent(Hanushek). “ There are so many areas of education that require money(Shanker).” When you are able to reduce the size of a classroom you allow the teacher the opportunity to give additional help by spending more time with each individual student(Shanker). Also, higher teacher salaries are very important when it comes to having the best teachers(Shanker). Studies show that raising the city’s basic per-pupil allocation from $9,306 to $11,608 will provide better technology and better teachers(Brown). Smaller classroom size and better teachers have a positive effect ...
Adolph Wagner’s theory, The Wagner’s Law, is supported by a key paper (Busemeyer, 2007). The law became popular after previous work from key economists like Adam Smith, stating that over time as the economy develops, public expenditure should increase. The study explored 21 OECD democracies’ relationship between GDP per capita and public education expenditure from 1980-2001. Using different classifications of variables, he found that economic variable (GDP per capita) was positively associated with public education spending. However, during this time there were only 30 OECD members, excluding Israel. Yet, similar results are portrayed to (Strawczynski & Zeira, 2003). (Busemeyer, 2007) also marked that a country’s wellbeing has a substantial impact on education spending, in which a country with a strong economic development has opportunities for education expansions. When including country fixed effects, the law is not stipulated. (Lamartina & Zaghini, 2011) also agreed with The Wagner...
With the majority of students living in the U.S. attending public schools, the quality of the entire public education system not only affects each individual student’s ability to continue towards a secondary level of education if choosing to do so but also be positioned to get a good job utilizing the primary public education provided. The quality of public education from a much bigger perspective also shapes the nation’s ability to compete in a global economy. As many of the developing nations over the past 25 -30 years understand extremely well, quality investment in the public education system is one of the surest means to improving a nation’s economic standing and further growth.
Higher educational level opportunities are inadequate, resulting in shortages of skilled labor. The lack of skilled workers is a problem both for investors and for government efforts to improve public administration. Budgetary constraints limit the scope for developing education.
...mpared to privately funded school sizes. According to (NCES) the average school size for a central city, state-funded school is 1,083 compared to 398 in privately funded school. That means teachers will have an even harder time giving a state-funded the same one on one time when compared to the privately funded school. Since the education is not equal to private schools should be abolished.
Graduates of the Philippines may now have a greater chance to compete in the international labor market. Promotion and other qualification is being based on the educational background adding another year of education is a privilege. And we must remember grade 11 and grade 12 is being subsidized by the government (free). The chances of economic growth in a wider perspective of K to 12 result inspires lower poverty ratio for the country. Changing the system we are accustomed is hard, believing in a new ideology and undertaking an idea of additional year can be perceived as a great burden. One must know in order to create a sustainable environment/economy. We must know the challenges around. A nation’s economy determines poverty and social being of its citizen. The effect of K to 12 is indeed a long term process. But what else can we do, besides we’ve always been goo at waiting for progress. We should remember, answering same question with the same solution takes lower chances of success than answering questions using different strategies. K to 12 is an aid for economic growth.
Education is the vital issue of our lives. And we try to get or provide our children with the most qualified and most suitable education for us. There is not of course just one type of school or education. There are public schools and private schools in today’s world. To decide which one we will choose and we have to know the differences and similarities about the public and private schools as well. We can compare the two types of K-12 schools in the light of some criteria such as things which are graduation rates, cost, teachers, safety and taught.
Experimental Economics in Schools.” Phychological Record (2012):. The Center for the Economics of Education. Web. 21 Apr. 2014.
Likewise, the construction of primary school increased from 11,873 in 2001 to 15,816 in 2010 with registration doubled from 4,875,185 to 8,419,305 in the same year. Secondary school construction alike, increased by 355% in the same period (Mihayo, 2011) cited from Haki Elimu. At least, above a 100% of children now access education (Mihayo, 2011; UNESCO, 2011). Yet, enrollment t increase does not correspond with the quality of education, where primary school graduates cannot calculate standard II level basic mathematics. They can hardly read standard II level Kiswahili (World Bank, 2012; Mihayo, 2011 2014; Uwezo, 2012; Hartwig, 2013). This is not to say, the ability to read and write remain the only measure for ensuring students’ cognizant capability. Literary ability must be beyond the reading and writing to numerical and technological knowledge (Shank & Brown, 2013). Schools cannot improve skills and technology, if they suffer from scantiness of teachers, or sometimes have unqualified teachers, and schools lack learning and teaching materials. Poor quality of education in primary school leads to a poor quality of education in secondary school (World Bank 2012; Uwezo, 2012). This is the reason for students’ failure in the national primary and secondary school exam each year, for instance, the (URoTMOEVT, 2012) national exam result Figure 1:2. I build on the same argument that,
If we build a primary school, we need to have much money. We can use that money to develop the economy. When the economy has developed, we can have a lot of money and build many primary schools later. For example, we use ten millions dollars for the economy. After several year, we can use the profit from that investment to build primary schools. In addition, in many poor countries, children are very helpful for house works such as farming and ranching. In some families, there are more than five children, so they can help their parents very much in house works. For example, instead of their parents have to hire other people to do house works, children can help their parents in a rice field. Furthermore, it wastes time if we build primary schools. They have to waste several months or several years to build a primary school and train teacher’s teams. For example, they waste a year for building a primary school and train teachers, but they do not receive any things for their countries’ development. To sum up, primary schools are enough and they waste many things for country’s