Professor Steve Ross’s recent working paper with Steve Billings and Andrew Bibler was featured today on the NBER website:
In this paper, they examine the effect of losing school mates or peers due to school choice. Specifically, in Charlotte-Mecklenburg county, they find that 5th grade students who have a 5th grade neighbor who applies for and wins a school choice lottery are substantially more likely to be arrested and incarcerated as a young adult. These increases in young adult arrests substantially outweigh the reduction in arrests that occur among the lottery winners, suggesting that school choice in this environment leads to an increase in crime.