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Can large, untargeted conditional cash transfers increase urban high school graduation rates? Evidence from Mexico City's Prepa Sí

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  • Dustan, Andrew

Abstract

This paper estimates the effects of a massive, minimally targeted conditional cash transfer program in Mexico City's public high schools on graduation rates, test scores, and school choice. Using a difference-in-differences approach that exploits variation in eligibility between students and cohorts within a high school, I find that this program had no appreciable effect on high school completion. The results are sufficiently precise to rule out policy-relevant effect sizes. Null effects persist for subgroups that could be candidates for a targeted program. End-of-high school exam scores are apparently unaffected by the program and effects on high school choices by eligible students are minimal. There is no evidence for heterogeneous effects with respect to implicit or explicit cost of attendance, suggesting that liquidity constraints are not a key driver of high school dropout in this urban setting. These results highlight the challenges of using cash to improve academic outcomes in cities.

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  • Dustan, Andrew, 2020. "Can large, untargeted conditional cash transfers increase urban high school graduation rates? Evidence from Mexico City's Prepa Sí," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:143:y:2020:i:c:s0304387818312896
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2019.102392
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    1. Jules Gazeaud & Claire Ricard, 2021. "Conditional cash transfers and the learning crisis: evidence from Tayssir scale-up in Morocco," NOVAFRICA Working Paper Series wp2102, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Nova School of Business and Economics, NOVAFRICA.
    2. Bobba, Matteo & Frisancho, Veronica & Pariguana, Marco, 2016. "Perceived Ability and School Choices: Experimental Evidence and Scale-up Effects," TSE Working Papers 16-660, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE), revised Jul 2024.
    3. Kristiano Raccanello, 2022. "Quality of Life for Beneficiaries of an Unconditional Transfer Education Program in Mexico City," Economía: teoría y práctica, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, México, vol. 56(1), pages 201-226, Enero-Jun.
    4. Gazeaud, Jules & Ricard, Claire, 2024. "Learning effects of conditional cash transfers: The role of class size and composition," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).

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