Investing in kids
Subtitle: early childhood programs and local economic development
By: Timothy J. Bartik
Publisher: W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research
Published: 2011
Place of publication: Kalamazoo, Mich
Language: eng
Number of pages: 417
ISBN-13: 9780880993722; 9780880993739
Subjects: Early childhood education; Economic development
Description: Bartik measures ratios of local economic development benefits to costs for both early childhood education and business incentives. He shows that early childhood programs and the best-designed business incentives can provide local benefits that significantly exceed costs. --from publisher description
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 363-387) and index.
Table of contents: title: 1. Introduction. Clarifying previous thinking; title: A balanced economic development strategy: both labor demand and labor supply policies; title: The advantages of thinking and acting locally; title: Why consider early childhood programs and business incentives together?; title: A road map for this book; title: 2. The nature and importance of local economic development benefits, and how they are affected by labor demand and labor supply. What is local economic development policy?; title: The importance of local economic development; title: Economic development: what is it good for? Absolutely nothing except land values?; title: Hysteresis: an argument for why local job growth development might help workers; title: But why are jobs said to offer "benefits"? Is there "something special" about jobs?; title: But why are local jobs so important? After all, I could get those same job opportunities elsewhere; title: Other possible benefits of local job growth; title: Where the rubber hits the road: empirical evidence on the effects of increases in local labor demand; title: Not everyone agrees: the Blanchard-Katz perspective and its policy implications; title: The zero-sum-game argument: why care about local benefits when what count are national benefits?; title: If growth provides benefits, why worry about the details?; title: What are the labor supply policies that affect the quantity or quality of labor supply in a state or local area?; title: What are the key issues in how early childhood and other labor supply programs affect local economic development benefits?; title: Two perspectives on the benefits to out-movers; title: How mobile is the U.S. population?; title: How will a state or local area's employers respond to a local increase in labor force participation or job skills?; title: What about the response at the national level?; title: Conclusion; title: 3. Estimated economic development effects of well-designed business incentive programs. Types of business incentives; title: Business incentive effects; title: Financing and design of incentives; title: Effects of local job growth on local workers; title: Response to possible objections; title: Conclusion; title: 4. The economic development effects of high-quality early childhood programs. Context of these three early childhood programs; title: Summary of economic development benefits; title: Why you should care about 1 percent effects on earnings; title: Program description; title: Modeling economic development effects, part 1: spending; title: Modeling economic development effects, part 2: state labor market effects of increased labor supply of parents or former child participants; title: Does this analysis treat early childhood programs fairly compared to business incentives?; title: Conclusion; title: 5. Design matters: what features of business incentive programs and early childhood programs affect their economic development benefits? Business incentives; title: Early childhood programs; title: Conclusion; title: 6. Dealing with the known unknowns: how policymakers should deal with dueling estimates from researchers. Sources of uncertainty; title: The best response to uncertainty; title: Conclusion; title: 7. Bringing the future into the present: how policymakers should deal with the delayed benefits of early childhood programs. Discounting; title: Reducing short-run costs: postponing costs through borrowing; title: Reducing short-run costs: possible offsets from reduced special education costs; title: Reducing short-run government costs: financing pre-K out of the K-12 school budget; title: Increasing short-run benefits through capitalization; title: Increasing short-term benefits: incorporating parental employment programs into early childhood programs; title: Conclusion; title: 8. Who benefits? Distributional effects of early childhood programs and business incentives, and their implications for policy. Targeted pre-K versus universal pre-K; title: Business incentives: who benefits; title: Prekindergarten (pre-K) education: speculation about possible distributional benefits; title: Baseline results for distributional effects of universal pre-K; title: Adding in possible capitalization effects; title: Alternative distributional assumptions; title: Targeted versus universal pre-K; title: Targeting within universalism: universal pre-K with income-graduated fees; title: The abecedarian program: distributional effects of a large-scale targeted program; title: The nurse-family partnership: distributional effects of a smaller-scale antipoverty program; title: Conclusion; title: 9. Locality matters: how economic development benefits vary in diverse local economies. What this chapter is and isn't; title: The mechanisms by which locality matters; title: Empirical evidence on variation across states; title: Empirical evidence on metropolitan areas versus states; title: Empirical evidence on metropolitan area size; title: Empirical evidence on metro area growth; title: Conclusion; title: 10. The national perspective: how local business incentives and early childhood programs affect the national economy. National versus state benefits of business incentives; title: National versus state benefits of early childhood programs; title: Macroeconomic benefits or costs from redistributing jobs; title: Social benefits from more jobs: greater in high-unemployment local economies?; title: Federalism and business incentives: a policy wonk's perspective; title: Federalism and business incentives: a practical political perspective; title: Federalism and early childhood programs: a policy wonk's perspective; title: Federalism and early childhood programs: a practical political perspective; title: Conclusion; title: 11. The ethics of early childhood programs and business incentives. The philosophical argument against early childhood programs; title: The philosophical argument against business incentives; title: Common elements to the arguments against these government programs; title: The conceptual case for early childhood programs; title: Are early childhood programs really opposed to family rights?; title: The conceptual case for business incentives; title: Conclusion; title: 12. Extending economic development analysis to other human development programs: education, public health, crime reduction. Methodology; title: K-12 test scores; title: Educational attainment; title: Public health; title: Reducing crime; title: Conclusion; title: 13. Thinking and acting locally: what potential is there for local support for high-quality early childhood programs? Early childhood programs and local economic development: how do they fit into the big issues?; title: What can and should be done locally?; title: Is local action really politically feasible?; title: New thinking about early childhood programs and local economic development.