*Titles are subject to change
Driving Equity through Incentives?: Teacher Sorting and the Texas Teacher Incentive Allotment [Draft]
This study examines how financial incentives affect teacher mobility and retention under Texas’s Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA), a statewide performance based pay program. Using administrative data and an event study framework, I estimate the impact of TIA designation on movement, retention, and exits. I find results that indicate designation initially does not significantly alter overall movement rates. However, TIA influences destination choices, designated teachers are more likely to move to schools with moderate incentive levels but less likely to relocate to the highest need campuses, suggesting financial incentives alone may not offset non-monetary costs associated with teaching at these campuses. These findings contribute to the broader debate on teacher labor markets by highlighting the limitations of incentive driven redistribution strategies.
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 major choice as workers age. Quantile treatment effect estimates show that lower returns are not simply a reflection of inequality at the top of the earnings distribution but rather appear throughout the distribution. 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.