In many countries, college-bound high school seniors must pass a test or series of tests. In Israel, this requirement is known as the “Bagrut”, or matriculation certificate, obtained by passing a series of subject tests. In spite of the Bagrut’s value, Israeli society is marked by vast...

This paper investigates the question whether long-term human capital outcomes are affected by the duration of maternity leave, i.e. by the time mothers spend at home with their newborn before returning to work. Employing RD and difference-in-difference approaches, this paper exploits an...

This paper studies the effect of mothers' education on fertility in a mostly Muslim population with very low female labor force participation. We first show that a removal of travel restrictions on Israeli Arabs had raised female education and had almost no effect on male education. Next, we...

Schools and teachers are often said to be a source of stereotypes that harm girls. This paper tests for the existence of gender stereotyping and discrimination by public high-school teachers in Israel. It uses a natural experiment based on blind and non-blind scores that students receive on...

This paper reports estimates of the causal effects of a 50 percent increase in the salary of headmasters of high schools in Israel. The results suggest that the program led to significant improvements in twelfth-grade students' academic achievements. However, the effect was relatively modest,...

This paper presents estimates of willingness to pay for medical care, including the quality and intensity of medical treatment sought in response to illness or injury. The empirical analysis is based on some 5000 observations on the behavior of low income households in Ghana in 1986. The results...

There are large differences across countries in instructional time in schooling institutions. Can these differences explain some of the differences across countries in pupils' achievements in different subjects? What is the likely impact of changes in instructional time? While research in recent...

We study ability peer effects in English secondary schools using data on four cohorts of students taking age-14 national tests and measuring peers’ ability by prior achievements at age 11. Our identification is based on within-pupil regressions exploiting variation in achievements across three...