This paper provides findings from the UK Labour Force Surveys from 1993 to 2003 on the financial private returns to a degree – the “college premium”. The data covers a decade when the university participation rate doubled – yet we find no significant evidence that the mean return to a...

Many countries provide extensive in-kind public transfers for specific needs of particular client groups such as the elderly, the disabled, and children. However, this may crowd out private expenditures on the goods in question and, to some extent, undermine the case for not simply giving cash....

This paper addresses the intergenerational transmission of education and investigates the extent to which early school leaving (at age 16) may be due to variations in parental background. An important contribution of the paper is to distinguish between the causal effects of parental income and...

This article explores how the UK welfare benefit system subsidise or penalise couples for living together as partners. A couple is said to face a "partnership bonus" ("penalty") if they can receive more (less) benefits when living as partners than when living separately. Using data on existing...

This paper investigates the relationship between attendance at nursery school and children's outcomes in adolescence. In particular, we are interested in child cognitive development at ages 11, 14 and 16, intentions towards tertiary education, economic activity in early adulthood, and in a group...