Sources of educational inequality and redistributive behavior: Experimental evidence

Last registered on June 05, 2023
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Sources of educational inequality and redistributive behavior: Experimental evidence
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0009717
Initial registration date
July 08, 2022

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
July 08, 2022, 12:09 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated
June 05, 2023, 5:12 AM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country
United States of America
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Ines Lee
Affiliation
University of Cambridge
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Eileen Tipoe
PI Affiliation
Queen Mary University of London
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2022-07-08
End date
2022-08-12
Keywords
Behavior, Education, Labor
Additional Keywords
Attitudes toward inequality, Education, Policy preferences, Survey experiment
JEL code(s)
D63, D64, D83, I24
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
We provide causal evidence on how beliefs about the sources of educational inequalities support for policies or initiatives that reduce education-related inequalities. We first elicit participants’ beliefs about how college attendance varies by socioeconomic status. Half of the participants will then receive the actual statistics, taken from Chetty et al. (2020). We then measure participants’ support for reducing income inequality between college and non-college graduates, support for educational reform policies, and willingness to donate to charities that promote access to higher education. This document outlines our plan for data analysis.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Lee, Ines and Eileen Tipoe. 2023. "Sources of educational inequality and redistributive behavior: Experimental evidence." AEA RCT Registry. June 05. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.9717-3.1
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2022-07-08
Intervention End Date
2022-08-12

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
(1) Charitable donations
(2) Preferred earnings ratio between college and non-college graduates (ex-post redistribution)
(3) Support for policies that reduce barriers to attending college (ex-ante policy support)
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
(1) Charitable donations: Participants will be told they have been automatically enrolled in a lottery for $100 and, if they win, they can choose to donate some (or all or none) of their winnings to a charity whose primary mission is to tackle inequalities in educational attainment at the tertiary level.

(2) Preferred earnings ratio between college and non-college graduates (ex-post redistribution): Participants will be given the current income ratio between the average college graduate and average non-college graduate and asked what they think the income disparity between these two individuals should be.

(3) Support for policies that reduce financial barriers to attending college (ex-ante policy support): Participants are provided with information on a policy that aims to reduce financial barriers to attending college (expanding the size of the Pell Grant, encouraging colleges to offer automatic application fee waivers for low-income students). They are then asked how much they would support the given policy.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We first elicit participants’ beliefs about inequality in college attendance, measured by the percentage of 4-year-college attendees in a given birth cohort who grew up in each quintile of the income distribution. Using a between-subjects design, we then randomly allocate participants to a treatment or control group. The treatment group receives information about the true percentages of college attendees who grew up in households whose income is in the bottom or top quintile of the distribution. The control group receives information about college attendees that is unrelated to inequalities in educational attainment. Both sets of information are computed using deidentified administrative data by Chetty et al. (2020).

We then measure two self-reported outcomes (the preferred wage ratio between college and non-college graduates and support for policies that reduce financial barriers to attending college), and one real outcome (the choice to make an actual donation to an education-related charity). We also ask questions to understand the mechanisms through which the information treatment affects these outcomes.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomizer in Qualtrics with the option "evenly present elements".
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
2000 individuals
Sample size: planned number of observations
2000 individuals
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
1000 people in each treatment
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
1400 participants will give us 0.8 power to detect an effect size of 0.10 of a standard deviation between the treatment and the control group in the main study at a .05 significance level. Therefore, the 2000 participants from the main study will give us more than 0.8 power to detect the same effect size.
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
University of Cambridge Faculty of Economics Research Ethics Committee
IRB Approval Date
2022-05-23
IRB Approval Number
UCAM-FoE-22-01
Analysis Plan

Analysis Plan Documents

Educationism pre-analysis plan Jul2022.pdf

MD5: 09fdf32bb3463b71b978e9e06d4ac26f

SHA1: 539a6d8d53bcb73e367bebaf5cc5cf060ed49579

Uploaded At: June 05, 2023

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
Yes
Intervention Completion Date
August 10, 2022, 12:00 +00:00
Data Collection Complete
Yes
Data Collection Completion Date
August 10, 2022, 12:00 +00:00
Final Sample Size: Number of Clusters (Unit of Randomization)
2,008
Was attrition correlated with treatment status?
No
Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
2,008
Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
998 control participants, 1010 treatment participants
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials