Early Childhood Education Fails Another Randomized Trial
Public programs for pre-K education have a worthy goal: reducing the gaps in educational achievement that manifest themselves in early grades. I find myself rooting for such programs to succeed. But there are now two major randomized control trial studies looking at the the results of publicly provided pre-K programs, and neither one finds lasting success. Mark W. Lipsey, Dale C. Farran, and Kelley Durkin report the results of the most recent study in "Effects of the Tennessee Prekindergarten Program on children’s achievement and behavior through third grade" (Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 2018, online version April 21, 2018).
- 20/07/2018
- 6
Conflict Minerals and Unexpected Tradeoffs
The cause seemed worthy, and the policy mild. Militia groups in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) were taxing and extorting revenue from those who mined like tin, tungsten, and tantalum. Thus, Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 required companies to disclose the source of their purchases of such minerals. The hope was to reduce funding for the militias, and thus to benefit people in the area. Human rights advocacy groups supported the idea. The Good Intentions Paving Company was up and running.
- 19/07/2018
- 3
On Preferring A to B, While Also Preferring B to A
"In the last quarter-century, one of the most intriguing findings in behavioral science goes under the unlovely name of preference reversals between joint and separate evaluations of options. The basic idea is that when people evaluate options A and B separately, they prefer A to B, but when they evaluate the two jointly, they prefer B to A." Thus, Cass R. Sunstein begins his interesting and readable paper "On preferring A to B, while also preferring B to A" (Rationality and Society 2018, first published July 11, 2018, subscription required).
- 18/07/2018
- 5
China Stops Importing Waste Plastic
For a few decades now, the US and Europe have been managing their plastic waste by shipping it to China and other countries in east Asia for recycling and reuse. But in the last few years, China has been tightening up what it was willing to import, wanting only plastic waste that is uncontaminated. In 2017, China announced that in the future it was banning the import of nonindustrial plastic waste -- that is the plastic waste generated by households.
- 16/07/2018
- 5
Time to Reform Unemployment Insurance
The best time to fix your roof is when the weather is sunny and warm, not when it's rainy, cold--and actually leaking. In a similar spirit, the best time to fix unemployment insurance is when the unemployment rate is low. Conor McKay, Ethan Pollack, andAlastair Fitzpayne offer some ideas in "Modernizing Unemployment Insurance for the Changing Nature of Work" (Aspen Institute, January 2018). They write:
- 14/07/2018
- 5
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