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Author: Wozny, Nathan
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Rothstein, Jesse
Wozny, Nathan
Permanent Income and the Black-White Test Score Gap
Working Paper No. 17610. National Bureau of Economic Research, November 2011.
Also: http://www.nber.org/papers/w17610
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Keyword(s): Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS-B, ECLS-K); Economics of Discrimination; Ethnic Differences; Family Income; Modeling, Instrumental Variables; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading); Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT); Racial Differences; Test Scores/Test theory/IRT; Tests and Testing

Analysts often examine the black-white test score gap conditional on family income. Typically only a current income measure is available. We argue that the gap conditional on permanent income is of greater interest, and we describe a method for identifying this gap using an auxiliary data set to estimate the relationship between current and permanent income. Current income explains only about half as much of the black-white test score gap as does permanent income, and the remaining gap in math achievement among families with the same permanent income is only 0.2 to 0.3 standard deviations in two commonly used data sets. When we add permanent income to the controls used by Fryer and Levitt (2006), the unexplained gap in 3rd grade shrinks below 0.15 standard deviations, less than half of what is found with their controls.
Bibliography Citation
Rothstein, Jesse and Nathan Wozny. "Permanent Income and the Black-White Test Score Gap." Working Paper No. 17610. National Bureau of Economic Research, November 2011.