This paper defines and estimates general equilibrium treatment effects. The conventional approach in the literature on treatment effects ignores interactions among individuals induced by the policy interventions being studied. Focusing on the impact of tuition policy, and using estimates from...

This paper formulates and estimates an open-economy overlapping generation general-equilibrium model of endogenous heterogeneous human capital in the form of schooling and on-the-job training. Physical capital accumulation is also analyzed. We use the model to explain rising wage inequality in...

This paper develops and estimates an overlapping generations general equilibrium model of labor earnings, skill formation and physical capital accumulation with heterogeneous human capital. The model analyzes both schooling choices and post-school on-the-job investment in skills in a framework...

Missing from recent discussions of tax reform is any systematic analysis of the effects of various tax proposals on skill formation. This gap in the literature in empirical public finance is due to the absence of any empirically based general equilibrium models with both human capital formation...

Bureaucratic performance standards are featured in many proposals to increase efficiency in government. These standards reward bureaucrats on the basis of measured outcomes. The performance standards system created under the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) of 1982 is often cited as a...

This paper investigates the impact of wage subsidies on skill formulation. We analyze two prototypical models of skill formation: (a) a learning-by-doing model and (b) an on-the-job training model. We develop conditions on the pricing of jobs under which the two models are equivalent. In general...

This paper presents economic models of child development that capture the essence of recent findings from the empirical literature on skill formation. The goal of this essay is to provide a theoretical framework for interpreting the evidence from a vast empirical literature, for guiding the next...

The Mincer earnings function is the cornerstone of a large literature in empirical economics. This paper discusses the theoretical foundations of the Mincer model and examines the empirical support for it using data from Decennial Censuses and Current Population Surveys. While data from 1940 and...

This paper considers the interpretation of "Mincer rates of return." We test and reject the Mincer model. It fails to track the time series of true returns. We show how repeated cross section and panel data improves the ability of analysts to estimate the ex ante and ex post marginal rate of...

The internal rate of return to schooling is a fundamental economic parameter that is often used to assess whether expenditure on education should be increased or decreased. This paper considers alternative approaches to estimating marginal internal rates of return for different schooling levels....