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School spirit: Legislator school ties and state funding for higher education

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  • Chatterji, Aaron K.
  • Kim, Joowon
  • McDevitt, Ryan C.

Abstract

We explore a new mechanism to understand state funding for public colleges and universities by leveraging data on the educational experiences of state legislators, specifically if and where they received postsecondary education. Using novel, hand-collected data from 2002 through 2014, we provide comprehensive documentation – for the first time in the literature – on the educational backgrounds of state legislators. We find a statistically significant, positive association between the share of legislators who attended their states' public institutions and state funding for their entire public higher-education system. We also find a similar positive relationship between the share of state legislators who attended particular campuses of the state's public university system and funding for those campuses. This relationship is more pronounced among publicly educated legislators who represent legislative districts close to their alma mater's district, and becomes most consequential when the legislator's district contains his or her alma mater. We discuss the implications of our findings for academic studies on how politics and legislators' personal experiences influence support for higher education.

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  • Chatterji, Aaron K. & Kim, Joowon & McDevitt, Ryan C., 2018. "School spirit: Legislator school ties and state funding for higher education," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 254-269.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:164:y:2018:i:c:p:254-269
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2018.05.013
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    2. Meredith S. Billings & Paul G. Rubin & Denisa Gándara & Lindsey Hammond, 2024. "Higher Education Policy Narratives during COVID-19: How are Budget Requests Justified to State Legislatures?," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 65(4), pages 625-654, June.
    3. Artés, Joaquín & Richter, Brian Kelleher & Timmons, Jeffrey F., 2019. "The Value of Political Geography: Evidence from the Redistricting of Firms," Working Papers 291, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Higher education; State appropriations; State legislators;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures
    • H75 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Government: Health, Education, and Welfare
    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • I22 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Educational Finance; Financial Aid
    • I28 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Government Policy

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