IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp10091.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Short-Run Externalities of Civic Unrest: Evidence from Ferguson, Missouri

Author

Listed:
  • Gershenson, Seth

    (American University)

  • Hayes, Michael S.

    (Rutgers University)

Abstract

We document externalities of the civic unrest experienced in Ferguson, MO following the police shooting of an unarmed black teenager. Difference-in-differences and synthetic control method estimates compare Ferguson-area schools to neighboring schools in the greater St. Louis area and find that the unrest led to statistically significant, arguably causal declines in students' math and reading achievement. Attendance is one mechanism through which this effect operated, as chronic absence increased by five percent in Ferguson-area schools. Impacts were concentrated in elementary schools and at the bottom of the achievement distribution and spilled over into majority black schools throughout the area.

Suggested Citation

  • Gershenson, Seth & Hayes, Michael S., 2016. "Short-Run Externalities of Civic Unrest: Evidence from Ferguson, Missouri," IZA Discussion Papers 10091, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10091
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp10091.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Aucejo, Esteban M. & Romano, Teresa Foy, 2016. "Assessing the effect of school days and absences on test score performance," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 70-87.
    2. Timothy G. Conley & Christopher R. Taber, 2011. "Inference with "Difference in Differences" with a Small Number of Policy Changes," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(1), pages 113-125, February.
    3. David J. Deming, 2011. "Better Schools, Less Crime?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 126(4), pages 2063-2115.
    4. Alberto Abadie & Javier Gardeazabal, 2003. "The Economic Costs of Conflict: A Case Study of the Basque Country," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 113-132, March.
    5. O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), 1999. "Handbook of Labor Economics," Handbook of Labor Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 3, number 3.
    6. Dee, Thomas S., 2004. "Are there civic returns to education?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 1697-1720, August.
    7. Joshua D. Angrist & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2009. "Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 8769.
    8. Beland, Louis-Philippe & Kim, Dongwoo, 2014. "The Effect of High School Shootings on Schools and Student Performance," CLSSRN working papers clsrn_admin-2014-27, Vancouver School of Economics, revised 16 Jun 2014.
    9. Card, David, 1999. "The causal effect of education on earnings," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 30, pages 1801-1863, Elsevier.
    10. Cunha, Flavio & Heckman, James J. & Lochner, Lance, 2006. "Interpreting the Evidence on Life Cycle Skill Formation," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & F. Welch (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 12, pages 697-812, Elsevier.
    11. Richard Blundell & Lorraine Dearden & Barbara Sianesi, 2005. "Evaluating the effect of education on earnings: models, methods and results from the National Child Development Survey," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 168(3), pages 473-512, July.
    12. Abadie, Alberto & Diamond, Alexis & Hainmueller, Jens, 2010. "Synthetic Control Methods for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California’s Tobacco Control Program," Journal of the American Statistical Association, American Statistical Association, vol. 105(490), pages 493-505.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ellis, Jimmy R. & Gershenson, Seth, 2016. "LATE for the Meeting: Gender, Peer Advising, and College Success," IZA Discussion Papers 9956, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Bautista, M. A. & González, F. & Martínez, L. R. & Muñoz, P. & Prem, M., 2020. "Chile’s Missing Students: Dictatorship, Higher Education and Social Mobility," Documentos de Trabajo 18163, Universidad del Rosario.
    3. Peter Hull & Michal Kolesár & Christopher Walters, 2022. "Labor by design: contributions of David Card, Joshua Angrist, and Guido Imbens," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(3), pages 603-645, July.
    4. Hernæs, Øystein, 2018. "Activation against absenteeism – Evidence from a sickness insurance reform in Norway," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 60-68.
    5. 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.
    6. Bruno Ferman & Cristine Pinto, 2019. "Inference in Differences-in-Differences with Few Treated Groups and Heteroskedasticity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 101(3), pages 452-467, July.
    7. Bonin, Holger, 2017. "The Potential Economic Benefits of Education of Migrants in the EU," IZA Research Reports 75, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Hönig, Tillman, 2017. "The Impact of Peace: Evidence from Nigeria," MPRA Paper 83302, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Marc Piopiunik, 2011. "Microeconometric Analyses of Education Production in Germany," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 40.
    10. Eric A. Hanushek & Ludger Woessmann, 2008. "The Role of Cognitive Skills in Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(3), pages 607-668, September.
    11. Benedikt Siegler, 2015. "Microeconometric Evaluations of Education Policies," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 57.
    12. Arteaga, Carolina, 2018. "The effect of human capital on earnings: Evidence from a reform at Colombia's top university," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 212-225.
    13. Kristinn Hermannsson & Patrizio Lecca, 2016. "Human Capital in Economic Development: From Labour Productivity to Macroeconomic Impact," Economic Papers, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 35(1), pages 24-36, March.
    14. Martin Schlotter & Guido Schwerdt & Ludger Woessmann, 2011. "Econometric methods for causal evaluation of education policies and practices: a non-technical guide," Education Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(2), pages 109-137.
    15. Kai Barron & Luis F. Gamboa & Paul Rodríguez-Lesmes, 2019. "Behavioural Response to a Sudden Health Risk: Dengue and Educational Outcomes in Colombia," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(4), pages 620-644, April.
    16. Raffaello Bronzini & Sauro Mocetti & Matteo Mongardini, 2020. "The economic effects of big events: Evidence from the great jubilee 2000 in Rome," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 801-822, September.
    17. Anders Hjorth-Trolle, 2018. "Beliefs, parental investments, and intergenerational persistence: A formal model," Rationality and Society, , vol. 30(1), pages 108-154, February.
    18. Dennis Shen & Peng Ding & Jasjeet Sekhon & Bin Yu, 2022. "Same Root Different Leaves: Time Series and Cross-Sectional Methods in Panel Data," Papers 2207.14481, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2022.
    19. Eleftherios Giovanis & Oznur Ozdamar, 2021. "Regional employment support programs and multidimensional poverty of youth in Turkey," Eurasian Economic Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 11(4), pages 583-609, December.
    20. Sonja Settele & Reyn van Ewijk, 2017. "The effect of cigarette taxes during pregnancy on educational outcomes of the next generation," IAAEU Discussion Papers 201703, Institute of Labour Law and Industrial Relations in the European Union (IAAEU).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    natural experiment; achievement gaps; Ferguson; civic unrest; externalities;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I2 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education
    • R00 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10091. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.