Paying Students to Stay in School : Short- and Long-term Effects of a Conditional Cash Transfer in England

McKendrick, Andrew (2022) Paying Students to Stay in School : Short- and Long-term Effects of a Conditional Cash Transfer in England. Working Paper. Lancaster University, Department of Economics, Lancaster.

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Abstract

I examine the impact of the Education Maintenance Allowance, a conditional cash transfer in England that was available nationally from 2004 to 2011, on a range of short- and long-term outcomes. Average treatment effects are identified, assuming unconfoundedness, using Inverse Probability Weighting Regression Adjustment. Treatment effect heterogeneity is examined using Causal Forests, a new machine learning approach. I find beneficial impacts of EMA on retention, university attendance and, for the first time, insecure work, as measured by the probability of being on a “zero hours” contract. Other outcomes (educational attainment, risky behaviours, and labour market outcomes) are found not to be impacted.