Learning to do well or learning to do good? Estimating the effects of schooling on civic engagement, social cohesion, and labor market outcomes in the presence of endowments

Abstract

Although some point to the large effects of schooling on civic engagement (usually measured in terms of volunteering and participation in civic organizations) and social cohesion (usually measured in terms of social networks and relationship quality), the effects of schooling on social outcomes have not been estimated with the same rigor as the effects of schooling on labor-market outcomes, such as earnings. In particular, previous research has failed to consider (i) the many potential and often unobserved confounding factors (“endowments”) influencing both schooling and social outcomes, including family upbringing, innate characteristics, and personality, and (ii) the ways in which schooling pushes individuals in multiple directions simultaneously, including toward greater social engagement, but also toward more independent and market-driven pursuits. Using samples of unrelated persons, ordinary siblings, and identical twins, this study explores the effects of schooling on measures of civic engagement and social relationships, as well as labor-force earnings and labor-force participation. The siblings models reveal a more complex picture than typically suggested by standard individual estimates. On one hand, the results reveal a robust positive effect of schooling on earnings: well-schooled persons work more and earn more, albeit not as much as associations without control for endowments suggest. On the other hand, the results reveal more tenuous and occasionally negative effects of schooling on social outcomes. The effects of schooling on volunteering and membership in civic organizations, for example, disappear almost entirely with control for endowments. Also, within-identical-twins models reverse the positive effects of schooling on reports of support from friends, family, and coworkers. These results may reflect the tension schooling creates between market and non-market commitments, as well as between independence and interpersonal reliability. Schooling may, indeed, induce some pro-social behaviors, but schooling allows individuals choices of whether to pursue more personal interests as well.