ISER External Seminar: Afraid to go to School? Estimating the Effect of Homicides on Human Capital Investments

Sandwiches served from 12.15

Abstract:
Homicides are the crudest outcome of violence and crime. They may instil fear with observers and may lead to behavioural adjustments. We use a number of large administrative Brazilian datasets to estimate the causal effect of exposure to homicides in the public way on schooling outcomes. Within-school estimates show that violence in the surroundings of schools, at the residence of students, and on the walking path from residence to school has a negative effect on a number of measures of school achievement such as test scores, repetition, dropout and school progression. We also find that school attendance suffers following a homicide in the school surroundings. Exceptionally rich data allow us to investigate heterogeneous effects and explore the channels underlying these effects.