Holmlund, Helena (2008) A researcher's guide to the Swedish compulsory school reform. CEEDP, 87. Centre for the Economics of Education, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK. ISBN 9780853281948
|
PDF
Download (760Kb) | Preview |
Abstract
When studying different types of returns to education, educational reforms are commonly used in the economics literature as a source of exogenous variation in education. The Swedish compulsory school reform is one example; the reform extended compulsory education throughout the country, in different municipalities at different points in time. Such variation across cohorts and regions can be used in a differences-in-differences framework, in order to estimate causal effects of education. This paper provides a guide to researchers who consider using the Swedish reform in an empirical analysis: I present a description and background of the reform, provide some baseline results, a reliability analysis of the reform coding, a discussion of whether the reform is a valid instrument, and comment on the interpretation of IV estimates of returns to schooling. The main conclusions are the following: i) a reliability analysis of the reform coding finds a lower bound reliability estimate of 0.66-0.91; ii) the reform indeed raised educational attainment, more so for boys than for girls, and iii) with careful consideration of region-specific trends, the reform can be considered a valid instrument for education.
| Item Type: | Monograph (Discussion Paper) |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | http://cee.lse.ac.uk |
| Additional Information: | © 2008 Helena Holmlund |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | educational reform, instrumental variables |
| Library of Congress subject classification: | L Education > L Education (General) |
| Journal of Economic Literature Classification System: | I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I2 - Education |
| Sets: | Research centres and groups > Centre for the Economics of Education (CEE) Collections > Economists Online Research centres and groups > Centre for Economic Performance (CEP) |
| Rights: | http://www.lse.ac.uk/library/rights/LSERO.htm |
| Identification Number: | 87 |
| URL: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/19382/ |
Actions (login required)
 |
Record administration - authorised staff only |
