There is a strong, positive, and well-documented correlation between education and health outcomes. In this paper, we attempt to understand to what extent this relationship is causal. Our approach exploits two changes to British compulsory schooling laws that generated sharp across-cohort differences in educational attainment. Using regression discontinuity methods, we find the reforms did not affect health although the reforms impacted educational attainment and wages. Our results suggest caution as to the likely health returns to educational interventions focused on increasing educational attainment among those at risk of dropping out of high school, a target of recent health policy efforts. (JEL H52, I12, I21, I28)The causal effect of education on health is a key parameter. It is central to models of the demand for health capital (Grossman 1972) and models of the influence of childhood development on adult outcomes (Heckman 2007; Conti, Heckman, and Urzua 2010). It is also relevant to macroeconomic growth models that incorporate mortality and human capital accumulation (Acemoglu and Johnson 2007; Cervellati and Sunde 2005; Galor and Weil 2000; Soares 2005). Moreover, if the health effects of education are large enough, then education policies might be powerful tools for improving health, especially in comparison to additional health care spending, the returns to which are uncertain (Weinstein and Skinner 2010).Regardless of the education level, time period, and country being studied, a strong positive correlation emerges between education and health. 1 A recent quasiexperimental literature suggests that the causal effect of education on health is at least as large as the partial correlation (e.g., Lleras-Muney 2005). Some studies even suggest that these causal health effects could outweigh the well-documented 1 See Goldman (2001) and references cited therein for a good summary of this literature. There are many correlational studies that look at several different dimensions of the health-education gradient: over time (Pappas et al. 1993); over the life cycle (Beckett 2000; Lynch 2003); across sexes (Christenson and Johnson 1995;McDonough et al. 1999); and across races (Williams and Collins 1995). The first seminal study of this relationship was that of Kitagawa and Hauser (1968).

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In this paper I assess the impact of the youth labour market on enrolment in post-compulsory education. To that end, I construct data for a panel of English regions and identify youth labour market effects using variation in youth unemployment rates across regions and over time. My estimates suggest that the youth labour market has large enrolment impacts, at least twice as large as suggested by UK estimates based on time series data. This helps to explain why enrolment growth slowed down from the mid-1990s and suggests that a weakening youth labour market could cause enrolment to increase again.

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Selective Schools and Academic AchievementDamon Clark The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn is a local and virtual international research center and a place of communication between science, politics and business. IZA is an independent nonprofit company supported by Deutsche Post World Net. The center is associated with the University of Bonn and offers a stimulating research environment through its research networks, research support, and visitors and doctoral programs. IZA engages in (i) original and internationally competitive research in all fields of labor economics, (ii) development of policy concepts, and (iii) dissemination of research results and concepts to the interested public. D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SIZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available directly from the author. In this paper I consider the impact of attending a selective high school in the UK. Students are assigned to these schools on the basis of a test taken in primary school and, using data on these assignment test scores for a particular district, I exploit this rule to estimate the causal effects of selective schools on test scores, high school course taking and university enrollment. Despite the huge peer advantage enjoyed by selective school students, I show that four years of selective school attendance generates at best small effects on test scores. Selective schools do however have positive effects on course-taking and university enrollment, evidence suggesting they may have important longer run impacts.JEL Classification: C21, I21

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