*Titles are subject to change
Incentives, Credentials, and the Limits of Teacher Sorting: Evidence from Performance Pay in Texas
In this paper I study how performance-based compensation affects teacher mobility and sorting using the Texas Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA), a statewide program introduced in 2019. TIA gives teachers a tiered quality designation, Recognized, Exemplary, or Master, based on performance evaluations and value-added measures. These designations are portable across schools and come with a salary supplement that rises with school disadvantage and rural status. Using administrative data on Texas public school teachers, I combine a staggered difference-in-differences event-study design with a discrete choice model of school choice that allows for heterogeneous teacher preferences over school SES. I find that TIA increases post-designation mobility, but that the additional movement tilts toward more advantaged campuses rather than the highest-need schools. Preference estimates imply that the average designated teacher requires roughly $6,047 in additional annual compensation to accept a 1SD increase in school disadvantage, while the salary gradient created by TIA falls short of that benchmark at every designation level. These results suggest that TIA's portable credential expands effective teachers' outside options, but that the SES-targeted pay gradient is too shallow to redirect that added mobility toward disadvantaged schools.
The Contribution of College Majors to Gender and Racial Earnings Differences with Scott A. Imberman, Michael F. Lovenheim, Kevin Stange, and Rodney J. Andrews
Gender and racial/ethnic gaps in labor market earnings remain large, even among college-goers. Cross-gender and race/ethnic differences in choice of and returns to college major are potentially important contributors. Following Texas public high school graduates for up to 20 years through college and the labor market, we assess gender and racial differences in college major choices and the consequences of these choices. Women and underrepresented minorities are less likely than men, Whites, and Asians to major in high earning fields like business, economics, engineering, and computer science, however we also show that they experience lower returns to these majors. Differences in major-specific returns relative to liberal arts explain about one quarter of the gender, White-Black, and White-Hispanic (but not White-Asian) earnings gaps among four-year college students and become larger contributors to earnings gaps than differential major distributions as workers age. We present suggestive evidence that differences in occupation choices within field are a key driver of the differences in returns across groups. The work shines light on the roles that college major choice and returns by gender and race contribute to inequality.