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Historical religious concentrations and the effects of Catholic schooling

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  • Cohen-Zada, Danny
  • Elder, Todd

Abstract

The causal effects of Catholic schooling on student outcomes have proven challenging to estimate, with several previous studies using the proportion of a geographic unit's population which is Catholic as a potentially exogenous source of variation in the availability of Catholic high schools. We propose a new approach which instead relies on the historical distribution of religious preferences. Specifically, we find that county-level Catholic shares measured at the end of the 19th century are far more strongly associated with Catholic school attendance than are current Catholic shares. Using several strategies, we show that historical Catholic shares are likely to be exogenous to student outcomes conditional on the current distribution of religion. Estimates based on this identification strategy point to smaller Catholic schooling effects than those implied by OLS, in contrast to instrumental variables estimates from previous studies.

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  • Cohen-Zada, Danny & Elder, Todd, 2009. "Historical religious concentrations and the effects of Catholic schooling," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 65-74, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:66:y:2009:i:1:p:65-74
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    Cited by:

    1. Heller-Sahlgren, Gabriel, 2018. "Smart but unhappy: Independent-school competition and the wellbeing-efficiency trade-off in education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 66-81.
    2. Siyu Heng & Dylan S. Small & Paul R. Rosenbaum, 2020. "Finding the strength in a weak instrument in a study of cognitive outcomes produced by Catholic high schools," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 183(3), pages 935-958, June.
    3. Cardak, Buly A. & Vecci, Joe, 2013. "Catholic school effectiveness in Australia: A reassessment using selection on observed and unobserved variables," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 34-45.
    4. Kim, Young-Joo, 2011. "Catholic schools or school quality? The effects of Catholic schools on labor market outcomes," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 546-558, June.
    5. Jose Fernandez & Stephan Gohmann & Joshua C. Pinkston, 2018. "Breaking Bad in Bourbon Country: Does Alcohol Prohibition Encourage Methamphetamine Production?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 84(4), pages 1001-1023, April.
    6. Gihleb, Rania & Giuntella, Osea, 2017. "Nuns and the effects of catholic schools. Evidence from Vatican II," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 191-213.
    7. Paula Herrera-Idárraga & Enrique López-Bazo & Elisabet Motellón, 2012. "Informality and overeducation in the labor market of a developing country," Working Papers XREAP2012-20, Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP), revised Nov 2012.
    8. Green, Colin P. & Navarro-Paniagua, María & Ximénez-de-Embún, Domingo P. & Mancebón, María-Jesús, 2014. "School choice and student wellbeing," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 139-150.
    9. Elder, Todd & Jepsen, Christopher, 2014. "Are Catholic primary schools more effective than public primary schools?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 28-38.

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