Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/145210 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 10076
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We examine the educational production function and efficiency of public school districts in Illinois. Using nonparametric kernel methods, we find that most traditional schooling inputs are irrelevant in determining test scores (even in a very general setting). Property tax caps are the only relevant factor that is related to districts' financial constraints and have predominantly negative associations with test scores. Therefore, insufficient resources may be partially responsible for the lack of growth in test scores. For most other relevant inputs, we find substantial heterogeneity in the returns, which helps reconcile some of the puzzling results in the literature. We further find that there exist inefficiencies in school districts. Moreover, the level of test scores, commonly used as a measure of school effectiveness, (while related) differs substantially from our efficiency scores, and standard parametric approaches drastically underestimate school efficiency. We discuss the policy implications of our results.
Subjects: 
stochastic frontier analysis
school inputs
property tax caps
panel data
nonparametric kernel
irrelevant inputs
educational production function
student achievement
technical efficiency
JEL: 
C14
C44
I21
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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