Do Human Capital Decisions Respond to the Returns to Education? Evidence from DACA / Elira Kuka, Na'ama Shenhav, Kevin Shih.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kuka, Elira.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Shenhav, Na'ama.

Shih, Kevin.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w24315.

NBER working paper series no. w24315

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2018.

Summary:

This paper studies human capital responses to the availability of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which provides temporary work authorization and deferral from deportation for undocumented, high-school-educated youth. We use a sample of young adults that migrated to the U.S. as children to implement a difference-in-differences design that compares non-citizen immigrants ("eligible") to citizen immigrants ("ineligible") over time. We find that DACA significantly increased high school attendance and high school graduation rates, reducing the citizen-noncitizen gap in graduation by 40%. We also find positive, though imprecise, impacts on college attendance.

Notes:

Print version record

February 2018.