<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Looking at the decentralized provision of public education in a middle-income country, this paper estimates the impact of local autonomy on service quality, finding large heterogeneity in the effect across different levels of local development. In the year 2002, Colombian municipalities were entrusted with autonomous management of their local public education based solely on a population threshold. I estimate the impact that autonomy has had on education performance across the territory, using a municipality and time fixed-effects model. I find a quality gap arising between highly developed and low-developed autonomous municipalities, in a trend that reinforces over time: the reform has induced regional inequality in education quality. I am able to support the hypothesis that autonomous and nonautonomous municipalities were on similar performance trends before decentralization was implemented, even when looking within different local development ranges. Based on the analysis of detailed municipal balance sheet data and administration indicators, I argue that local administration capacity represents the most likely explanation of why the autonomy-related discrepancies have been arising.</p></abstract>

Looking at the decentralized provision of public education in a middle-income country, this paper estimates the impact of local autonomy on service quality, finding large heterogeneity in the effect across different levels of local development. In the year 2002, Colombian municipalities were entrusted with autonomous management of their local public education based solely on a population threshold. I estimate the impact that autonomy has had on education performance across the territory, using a municipality and time fixed-effects model. I find a quality gap arising between highly developed and low-developed autonomous municipalities, in a trend that reinforces over time: the reform has induced regional inequality in education quality. I am able to support the hypothesis that autonomous and nonautonomous municipalities were on similar performance trends before decentralization was implemented, even when looking within different local development ranges. Based on the analysis of detailed municipal balance sheet data and administration indicators, I argue that local administration capacity represents the most likely explanation of why the autonomy-related discrepancies have been arising.

Cities drifting apart: Heterogeneous outcomes of decentralizing public education

IZA Journal of Labor Economics

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

{"article-title":"Cities drifting apart: Heterogeneous outcomes of decentralizing public education"}

Looking at the decentralized provision of public education in a middle-income country, this paper estimates the impact of local autonomy on service quality,...

Cities drifting apart: Heterogeneous outcomes of decentralizing public education

Published Online: Apr 29, 2020

Page range: -

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2020-0003

Keywords
decentralization, education inequality, development inequality

© 2020 Zelda Brutti, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Cities drifting apart: Heterogeneous outcomes of decentralizing public education

Published Online: Apr 29, 2020

Page range: -

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2020-0003

Keywordsdecentralization, education inequality, development inequality

© 2020 Zelda Brutti, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Keywords
decentralization, education inequality, development inequality