Skip to main content
Book cover

Explorations in Public Sector Economics pp 139–152Cite as

The Effect of Inter-School District Competition on Student Achievement: The Role of Long-Standing State Policies Prohibiting the Formation of New School Districts

  • 514 Accesses

Abstract

Efforts to estimate the effect of having more school districts (i.e., having more competition among school districts) have been hampered by the difficulty of finding a good instrument for the number of school districts. We identify 9 states in which the state requires that the school districts be county-wide or state-wide; these laws have been in place for almost 7 decades. In states with no restrictions on the formation of school districts, larger metropolitan areas have more school districts, and thus more inter-district competition. As expected, student test scores are higher in larger metro areas that do not require county-wide or state-wide districts. On the other hand, test scores are no higher in large metro areas than in small metro areas in states that prohibit any rise in the number of districts as the metro area grows.

Keywords

  • School District
  • Large Market
  • Metropolitan Statistical Area
  • School Quality
  • Small Market

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-47828-9_9
  • Chapter length: 14 pages
  • Instant PDF download
  • Readable on all devices
  • Own it forever
  • Exclusive offer for individuals only
  • Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout
eBook
USD   119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • ISBN: 978-3-319-47828-9
  • Instant PDF download
  • Readable on all devices
  • Own it forever
  • Exclusive offer for individuals only
  • Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout
Softcover Book
USD   159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
Hardcover Book
USD   159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
Learn about institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Note also that having more school districts makes it possible to have a more complete sorting of families according to their desired level of school quality. See Tiebout (1956).

  2. 2.

    In related research, Hoxby (2000) finds that per-pupil spending is lower in metropolitan areas with greater choice. Kenny and Schmidt (1994) find that state-wide and county-wide districts are less efficient than districts where competition is present. The laws that prevent within-county competition leads to a higher cost of education. As a result, these monopoly-like school districts spend an additional $866.5 million each year (1992 dollars).

  3. 3.

    See Ross et al. (2014) for an interesting study of the alignment of municipal boundaries and school district boundaries on class size.

  4. 4.

    The county of St. James, Louisiana has a population of nearly 21,000 land area of 246 mi\(^2\) and population density of 84 people/mi\(^2\).

  5. 5.

    The earliest data available are from 1947 and obtained from the Council of State Governments (2002).

  6. 6.

    Nevada had 196 school districts in 1952 but due to a funding crisis, consolidated to 17 districts after 1954 (Strang 1987).

  7. 7.

    Admittedly, this is a slight misnomer, since DC is a federal district and not a state.

  8. 8.

    The spline functions are defined as follows:

    $$\begin{aligned} \textit{MarketSizeSpline}1 = \left( {\begin{array}{c}\textit{MarketSize} \; \textit{if} \; \textit{MarketSize} \le M^*\\ M^* \; \textit{if} \; \textit{MarketSize}> M^*\end{array}}\right) \\ \textit{MarketSizeSpline}2 = \left( {\begin{array}{c}0 \; if \; \textit{MarketSize} \le M^*\\ \textit{MarketSize-M}* \; \textit{if} \; \textit{Markesize} > M^*\end{array}}\right) \\ \end{aligned}$$

    .

  9. 9.

    See Hoxby (2000), Zanzig (1997), and Rothstein (2007).

  10. 10.

    We also used raw scores as the dependent variable in all regressions, including grade dummies. We do not report these results here, as they were very similar.

  11. 11.

    Kenny and Schmidt (1994) and Bureau (2012).

  12. 12.

    See Fischel (2009) for a fascinating account of the determination of the number of school districts in the early 1900s.

References

  • Borland MV, Howsen RM (1992) Student academic achievement and the degree of market concentration in education. Econ Educ Rev 11(1):31–39

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Brunner EJ, Squires T (2013) The bargaining power of teachers unions and the allocation of school resources. J Urban Econ 76:15–27

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Bureau UC (2012) Statistical abstract of the United States. US Census Bureau, Washington DC

    Google Scholar 

  • (2002) The book of the states. Council of State Governments, Chicago

    Google Scholar 

  • Fischel WA (2009) Making the grade: the economic evolution of American school districts. University of Chicago Press, Chicago

    Google Scholar 

  • Fisher RC, Wassmer RW (1998) Economic influences on the structure of local government in US metropolitan areas. J Urban Econ 43(3):444–471

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Hoxby CM (2000) Does competition among public schools benefit students and taxpayers? Am Econ Rev 90(5):1209–1238

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Kenny LW, Schmidt AB (1994) The decline in the number of school districts in the US: 1950–1980. Public Choice 79(1–2):1–18

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Lott J, Kenny LW (2013) State teacher union strength and student achievement. Econ Educ Rev 35:93–103

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Markwardt FCJ (1998) Peabody individual achievement test-revised. American Guidance Service, Circle Pines

    Google Scholar 

  • Rose H, Sonstelie J (2010) School board politics, school district size, and the bargaining power of teachers unions. J Urban Econ 67(3):438–450

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Ross JM, Hall JC, Resh WG (2014) Frictions in polycentric administration with noncongruent borders: evidence from Ohio school district class sizes. J Public Admin Res Theory 24(3):623–649

    Google Scholar 

  • Rothstein J (2007) Does competition among public schools benefit students and taxpayers? Comment. Am Econ Rev 97(5):2026–2037

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Snyder TD (1998) Digest of Education Statistics, 1998. National Center for Education Statistics

    Google Scholar 

  • Strang D (1987) The administrative transformation of american education: school district consolidation, 1938–1980. Admin Sci Quart 32(3):352–366

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Tiebout CM (1956) A pure theory of local expenditures. J Polit Econ 64(5):416–424

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

  • Zanzig BR (1997) Measuring the impact of competition in local government education markets on the cognitive achievement of students. Econ Educ Rev 16(4):431–441

    CrossRef  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL, 32306, USA

    Katie Sherron

  2. University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, 32611, USA

    Lawrence W. Kenny

Authors
  1. Katie Sherron
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Lawrence W. Kenny
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lawrence W. Kenny .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, West Virginia University, Morgantown, USA

    Joshua Hall

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

Copyright information

© 2017 Springer International Publishing AG

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Sherron, K., Kenny, L.W. (2017). The Effect of Inter-School District Competition on Student Achievement: The Role of Long-Standing State Policies Prohibiting the Formation of New School Districts. In: Hall, J. (eds) Explorations in Public Sector Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47828-9_9

Download citation