2019
DOI: 10.1111/joes.12353
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New Evidence on the Heckman Curve

Abstract: The Heckman Curve characterizes the rate of return to public investments in human capital as rapidly diminishing with age. For the disadvantaged, it describes investments early in the life course as having significantly higher rates of return compared to later in life. This paper assesses the Heckman Curve using estimates of program benefit cost ratios from the Washington State Institute for Public Policy. We find no support for the claim that social policy programs targeted early in the life course have the l… Show more

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Cited by 25 publications
(17 citation statements)
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References 49 publications
(58 reference statements)
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“…Our findings contrast with, for example, Rea and Burton (2020), who do not find evidence of a Heckman curve. There are several potential reasons for this difference.…”
Section: Discussioncontrasting
confidence: 99%
See 1 more Smart Citation
“…Our findings contrast with, for example, Rea and Burton (2020), who do not find evidence of a Heckman curve. There are several potential reasons for this difference.…”
Section: Discussioncontrasting
confidence: 99%
“…We are only aware of few studies that attempt to find empirical support for the Heckman curve. A study by Rea and Burton is based on 314 cost–benefit analyses conducted by the Washington State Institute of Public Policy, that is, U.S. data (Rea and Burton, 2020). They plot the benefit–cost ratios against the average age of the intervention group and also perform regression analyses.…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Teens may also have been neglected due to a belief that intervention is more likely to be effective earlier in childhood. Yet recent reevaluations of the literature that cast a wider net in terms of which programs and studies they include in their evaluations suggest that it may be just as cost-effective to intervene in adolescence, particularly since at that age, it may be possible to more closely target intervention to the children who need it (Hendren & Sprung-Keyser, 2019;Rea & Burton, 2018). Even if a specific intervention in adolescence had a smaller "bang for the buck" per child, a targeted intervention might still prove more costeffective than a universal early childhood initiative.…”
Section: The Problem Of the Missing Middlementioning
confidence: 99%
“…The Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP (2018)) conducts ongoing cost-benefit analyses to assess policies relevant to state legislatures. See alsoRea and Burton (2018) for an application of the WSIPP data to comparative welfare analysis.12 The individual is willing to pay $1 for the tax cut and the government receives a $1 benefit from increased tax revenue from the behavioral response to the tax. In traditional cost-benefit analysis, increases in government tax revenue are included in the numerator of the expression.…”
mentioning
confidence: 99%