Abstract: Many regional governments in developed countries design programs to improve the competitiveness of local firms. In this paper, we evaluate the effectiveness of public programs whose aim is to enhance the performance of firms located in Catalonia (Spain). We compare the performance of...

A lack of longitudinal data prevents many countries from estimating dynamic models and, thus, from obtaining valuable evidence for policy making in the field of education. This is the case of Spain, where recent education reforms have targeted secondary schools, but their design has been based...

Social capital can be understood as network-based civic engagement, based on reciprocity and trust. This sociological approach, however, is faced with problems when assuming network-based social capital as a stock of capital. Any form of capital should have a positive economic payoff, should be...

One of the subjects that has focused the empirical work of many educational economists has been the public funding of privately run schools. In this paper we use a quasiexperimental approach in order to evaluate the effect of attending a Spanish publicly subsidised private school on some of the...

Between 1981 and 1990, Chile began to implement an education reform based on school choice and a financing system through vouchers. In theory, the system ensures complete freedom of choice of school by families. This paper attempts to identify the existence of factors that conditioned the...