Summer-born struggle: The effect of school starting age on health, education, and work

Abstract

Children starting school older consistently exhibit better educational outcomes. In this paper, we underscore child development as a mechanism driving this effect. Using unique administrative data on health examinations, we study the causal effect of school starting age (SSA) on a child's probability of being diagnosed with special educational needs in early grades. Results show that children with higher SSA are less likely to develop behavioral problems and speech impediments, whereas learning disabilities, ADHD, and dyslexia/dyscalculia remain unaffected. Importantly, these effects only arise after primary school entry and are not due to preexisting health conditions. We also find that teachers tend to over-refer relatively young children to special needs services, but this over-referring behavior is not driving the results, which are based on psychologists' diagnoses. The SSA effect persists throughout compulsory schooling, resulting in higher test scores and better quality vocational training contracts. However, SSA does not affect employment, earnings, or disability insurance benefits at labor market entry. © 2020 The Authors. Health Economics published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Keywords

Author Keywords

special needs school performance school starting age

Index Keywords

Employment human Humans Article educational status learning disorder school Schools academic achievement income age speech disorder employment status child primary school preschool child Child, Preschool dyslexia health status special education child development priority journal attention deficit disorder dyscalculia problem behavior

Author Affiliations

Department of Economics, University of St. Gallen, St Gallen, SG, Switzerland

Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States

Funding & Acknowledgements

Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung, SNF

Grant: 176381

Funding text 1: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc‐Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.; Funding text 2: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc-Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.

Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung, SNF

Funding text 1: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc‐Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.; Funding text 2: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc-Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.

Ministry of Education, MOE

Funding text 1: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc‐Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.; Funding text 2: We are grateful to the editor and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The paper has benefited from constructive comments by Christina Felfe, Mathias Huebener, Michael Lechner, Nicole Maestas, Marc-Andreas Muendler, Hannes Schwandt, Anthony Strittmatter, and Stefan Wolter. For the data, we thank the School Psychological Service, the Ministry of Education of the canton of St. Gallen, the Stellwerk test service provider, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office, and the Swiss Central Compensation Office. The paper benefited from valuable feedback at the following meetings: European Association of Labor Economists, Ski and Labor seminar, Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, and departmental seminars at the universities of Groningen, St. Gallen, Wuppertal, and Zurich. We acknowledge financing from the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant 176381) and declare no conflict of interest. This study has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of St. Gallen.

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Summer-born struggle: The effect of school starting age on health, education, and work

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