Structural estimation of a model of school choices: The Boston mechanism versus its alternatives

Caterina Calsamiglia; Chao  Fu; Maia Guell

doi:10.1086/704573

Structural estimation of a model of school choices: The Boston mechanism versus its alternatives

Caterina Calsamiglia, Chao Fu, Maia Guell

School of Economics

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

We model household choice of schools under the Boston mechanism (BM) and develop a new method, applicable to a broad class of mechanisms, to fully solve the choice problem even if it is infeasible via the traditional method. We estimate the joint distribution of household preferences and sophistication types, using administrative data from Barcelona. Counterfactual policy analyses show that a change from BM in Barcelona to the deferred-acceptance mechanism would decrease average welfare by €1,020, while a change to the top-trading-cycles mechanism would increase average welfare by €460.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	642-680
Number of pages	39
Journal	Journal of Political Economy
Volume	128
Issue number	2
Early online date	27 Dec 2019
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1086/704573
Publication status	Published - 28 Feb 2020

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

Boston mechanism

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10.1086/704573

CalsamiglialEtalJPE2019StructuralEstimationOfAModel
Accepted for publication by the Journal of Political Economy on 20 May 2019. Published in final form at: https://doi.org/10.1086/704573
Accepted author manuscript, 293 KB

Maia Guell
- School of Economics - Professor of Economics
Person: Academic: Research Active

Cite this

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AB - We model household choice of schools under the Boston mechanism (BM) and develop a new method, applicable to a broad class of mechanisms, to fully solve the choice problem even if it is infeasible via the traditional method. We estimate the joint distribution of household preferences and sophistication types, using administrative data from Barcelona. Counterfactual policy analyses show that a change from BM in Barcelona to the deferred-acceptance mechanism would decrease average welfare by €1,020, while a change to the top-trading-cycles mechanism would increase average welfare by €460.

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Structural estimation of a model of school choices: The Boston mechanism versus its alternatives

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Maia Guell

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