Does Competition Among Public Schools Benefit Students and Taxpayers?

Public employment and political pressure: The case of French hospitals

“…A well-known paper by Hoxby (2000) compares the productivity of public and private schools, and finds that competition resulting from the presence of private schools leads to an improvement in test scores in public schools, even though spending per pupil in the latter remains unchanged. One interpretation is that there is inefficiency in public schools.…”

Early effects of an early start: Evidence from lowering the school starting age in Poland

“…Many researchers follow Card (1995), who argued that geographic differences in the accessibility to school are a source of exogenous variation in educational choices. Distance to school, and other indicators of school accessibility have been used as an instrument in numerous studies looking for determinants of student achievements (inter alia : Hoxby 2000;Bettinger 2005;Schwartz, Stiefel et al 2013). In this study, however, another instrument is used 3 .…”

Voter support for privatizing education: evidence on self-interest and ideology

“…Hoxby (2001)]. On the competitive pressure exerted by private schools on public schools, see, for example, Couch et al (1993), Grosskopf et al (2001), Hoxby (2000), and Woessmann (2003). 4 A further potential shortcoming of public schooling mentioned in the literature is that public schools do not appear to do well in providing an agreeable social environment for their students.…”

“…8 If public schools are subject to Tiebout competition, this can, however, significantly reduce inefficiencies [cf. Hoxby (2000)]. …”