Publication:
The Fiscal Cost of Weak Governance: Evidence from Teacher Absence in India

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dc.contributor.authorMuralidharan, Karthik
dc.contributor.authorDas, Jishnu
dc.contributor.authorHolla, Alaka
dc.contributor.authorMohpal, Aakash
dc.date.accessioned2018-02-05T17:08:10Z
dc.date.available2018-02-05T17:08:10Z
dc.date.issued2017-01
dc.description.abstractThe relative return to strategies that augment inputs versus those that reduce inefficiencies remains a key open question for education policy in low-income countries. Using a new nationally-representative panel dataset of schools across 1297 villages in India, we show that the large public investments in education over the past decade have led to substantial improvements in input-based measures of school quality, but only a modest reduction in inefficiency as measured by teacher absence. In our data, 23.6% of teachers were absent during unannounced school visits, and we estimate that the salary cost of unauthorized teacher absence is $1.5 billion/year. We find two robust correlations in the nationally-representative panel data that corroborate findings from smaller-scale experiments. First, reductions in student-teacher ratios are correlated with increased teacher absence. Second, increases in the frequency of school monitoring are strongly correlated with lower teacher absence. Using these results, we show that reducing inefficiencies by increasing the frequency of monitoring could be over ten times more cost effective at increasing the effective student-teacher ratio than hiring more teachers. Thus, policies that decrease the inefficiency of public education spending are likely to yield substantially higher marginal returns than those that augment inputs.en
dc.identifier.citationJournal of Public Economics
dc.identifier.doi10.1596/29313
dc.identifier.issn0047-2727
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10986/29313
dc.publisherElsevier
dc.rightsCC BY 4.0
dc.rights.holderWorld Bank
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
dc.subjectEDUCATION
dc.subjectTEACHER ABSENTEEISM
dc.subjectGOVERNANCE
dc.subjectSTATE CAPACITY
dc.subjectMONITORING
dc.subjectRURAL SCHOOLS
dc.titleThe Fiscal Cost of Weak Governanceen
dc.title.subtitleEvidence from Teacher Absence in Indiaen
dc.typeJournal Articleen
dc.typeArticle de journalfr
dc.typeArtículo de revistaes
dspace.entity.typePublication
okr.associatedcontenthttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047272716301621 Journal website (version of record)en
okr.associatedcontenthttps://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/23918 Working paper version (pre-print)en
okr.crossref.titleThe Fiscal Cost of Weak Governance: Evidence from Teacher Absence in India
okr.date.disclosure2016-11-17
okr.doctypePublications & Research::Journal Article
okr.doctypePublications & Research
okr.externalcontentExternal Content
okr.guid682471524050009540
okr.identifier.doi10.1016/j.jpubeco.2016.11.005
okr.identifier.doi10.1596/29313
okr.identifier.report125236
okr.journal.nbpages116-35
okr.language.supporteden
okr.peerreviewAcademic Peer Review
okr.region.administrativeSouth Asia
okr.region.countryIndia
okr.topicEducation::Economics of Education
okr.topicEducation::Education Reform and Management
okr.topicEducation::Effective Schools and Teachers
okr.topicRural Development::Rural Education
okr.unitDECHD
okr.volume145
relation.isAuthorOfPublicationea440dcd-bd1b-5ecb-99eb-ac38454d8b51
relation.isAuthorOfPublication.latestForDiscoveryea440dcd-bd1b-5ecb-99eb-ac38454d8b51
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