Problem
Research questions and friction points this paper is trying to address.
disabled students
public education expansion
education reform
long-term impacts
educational access
The Short- and Long-Term Impacts of Expanding Public Education for Disabled Students
🤖 AI Summary
This study addresses the long-standing lack of empirical evidence on the systemic impacts of state-level reforms in the United States between 1949 and 1980 that mandated public schools to provide educational services for students with disabilities. Leveraging cross-state variation in policy adoption timing and combining historical administrative and survey data, the authors employ a difference-in-differences framework to identify the causal short- and long-run effects of these mandates on educational attainment, employment, family structure, and public finances for both disabled and non-disabled students and their families. The findings indicate that affected disabled students experienced an average increase of 0.23 years in schooling, a 20% reduction in the likelihood of receiving no formal education, and significantly higher employment rates. Positive spillovers were also observed for non-disabled peers and their mothers. Although per-pupil educational expenditures rose by 15%, the long-term fiscal benefits to government outweighed costs, suggesting the reform yielded positive fiscal returns.
📝 Abstract
Between 1949 and 1980, every U.S. state mandated public schools to provide educational services for disabled students. This is one of the largest education reforms in U.S. history, but little is known about its impacts. Given scarce data in this period, I compile survey and administrative datasets and set up a difference-in-difference design using variation in the mandates' timing. I show that the mandates increased both services for disabled students and preschool enrollments. In adulthood, disabled individuals below school age at a mandate's implementation became about 20% less likely to have no education, attained up to 0.23 more years of education, and were more likely to have worked. Although this policy could have taken away resources from non-disabled students, in fact, education and employment also increased for non-disabled individuals. These effects align with evidence that the mandates increased spending per student by up to 15%. Families were also impacted: the mandates increased employment among mothers of disabled children and the probability that disabled individuals became household heads. Over the long term, the mandates paid for themselves by generating government revenues in excess of their cost. These results provide new evidence on the large, broad impacts of expanding access to education for disabled students.
Innovation
Methods, ideas, or system contributions that make the work stand out.
difference-in-differences
administrative data integration
education policy evaluation
long-term fiscal impact
disability inclusion
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