The Welfare Effects of Coordinated Assignment: Evidence from the NYC HS Match / Atila Abdulkadiroğlu, Nikhil Agarwal, Parag A. Pathak.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Abdulkadiroğlu, Atila.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Agarwal, Nikhil.

Pathak, Parag A.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21046.

NBER working paper series no. w21046

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Other Title:

Welfare Effects of Coordinated Assignment

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2015.

Summary:

Coordinated single-offer school assignment systems are a popular education reform. We show that uncoordinated offers in NYC's school assignment mechanism generated mismatches. One-third of applicants were unassigned after the main round and later administratively placed at less desirable schools. We evaluate the effects of the new coordinated mechanism based on deferred acceptance using estimated student preferences. The new mechanism achieves 80% of the possible gains from a no-choice neighborhood extreme to a utilitarian benchmark. Coordinating offers dominates the effects of further algorithm modifications. Students most likely to be previously administratively assigned experienced the largest gains in welfare and subsequent achievement.

Notes:

Print version record

March 2015.