The impact of mining taxes on public education: Evidence for mining municipalities in Chile

Submitted by César Salazar on

Chilean mining municipalities collect a mineral tax to compensate for the negative externalities associated with resource extraction. Although this implies a positive marginal impact on local finance, there is not enough empirical evidence to support that this improves the quality of life in these communities. This article attempts to bridge this knowledge gap via a unique experimental framework, specifically, the Chilean tax system and a mining law that allows certain municipalities above an exogenous threshold to keep the extra income.

Policy Design

Knowing how and knowing when: unpacking public understanding of atmospheric CO2 accumulation

Submitted by Samuel Wakuma on
EfD Authors:

Abstract It has been demonstrated that most people have a limited understanding of atmospheric CO2 accumulation. Labeled stock-flow (SF) failure, this phenomenon has even been suggested as an explanation for weak climate policy support. Drawing on a typology of knowledge, we set out to nuance previous research by distinguishing between different types of knowledge of CO2 accumulation among the public and by exploring ways of reasoning underlying SF failure. A mixed methods approach was used and participants (N = 214) were enrolled in an open online course.

Climate Change, Experiments

Effect of education on migration decisions in Ghana: a rural-urban perspective

Submitted by Samuel Wakuma on

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of education on migration decisions focusing on rural and urban in-migrants by comparing the 2005/2006 and 2012/2013 rounds of the Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS5 and GLSS6). After correcting for selectivity bias, the authors observed that anticipated welfare gain and socio-economic variables such as sector of employment, sex, experience, age, educational level and marital status significantly affect an individual’s migration decision

Policy Design

Improving learning outcomes through information provision: Experimental evidence from Indian villages

Submitted by Vidisha Chowdhury on

We study how information to parents and schools on the performance of primary school children can improve learning outcomes in an environment where public and private schools co-exist. Contiguous village councils in the Indian state of Rajasthan are randomly assigned to either a control or one of four treatment groups in which student report cards on curriculum-based tests are provided to schools, parents or both. We find no changes in academic performance in public schools.

Policy Design

Quasi-experimental evidence on the political impacts of education in Vietnam

Submitted by Luat Do on
EfD Authors:

This paper estimates the causal effects of education on political concern and political participation in Vietnam by employing the 1991 compulsory schooling reform to instrument for plausibly exogenous changes in education. The paper finds that, in general, education does cause favorable impacts on political outcomes. In particular, one more year of schooling, on average, results in increases in the probabilities of political concern and political participation by about 6–12 percentage points and 6–8 percentage points, respectively.

Policy Design