In 2016, a group of school finance scholars and public school practitioners gathered in Jacksonville, Florida, for the National Education Finance Academy's annual conference to discuss, among an array of topics, the state of P-20 finance in all 50 states. At the roundtable discussion, 36 states were represented, and scholars representing 30 states…

Using a reduced form version of a theoretical expansion of Hoxby's (1996) education production model, we investigate whether bargaining teachers unions are a boon or a bust to the economy of the state. We anticipate teachers, being in the public sector veiled from competition, are less likely to be efficient. Yet, their product, education,…

This study investigates what factors are associated with the likelihood of passing school facility construction bonds by local district election. It uses statewide data from Michigan, 1998-2006, to examine the outcome of 789 bond elections in terms of the following ten variables: amount of the bond request; district enrollment; district locale;…

The fiscal capacity of a school district measures the difference between a district's ability to raise revenues locally and the expenditures needed to provide some specified level of educational services. This article uses several different approaches to calculate fiscal capacity for school districts in Ohio from 1996 to 2006. The results show…

A questionnaire survey of 331 Pennsylvania public school teachers gathered data on their attitudes toward Early Retirement Incentive Plans (ERIPs) and on their demographic and job characteristics. The results show teachers strongly support the ERIP concept, chiefly because of their desires to pursue second careers or leisure pursuits. (RW)

Changes in cash management practices from 1978 to 1981 were investigated in a random sample of 145 North Carolina school districts, stratified by attendance size. Analysis using chi-square tests indicated the level of investment sophistication (as measured by the proportion of cash invested) has increased, especially for large districts. (RW)

Research into voters' reasons for supporting or opposing Proposition 2 1/2, Massachusetts's 1980 property tax limitation measure, revealed that educational issues were of moderate importance and that voters were more interested in restructuring educational finance and governance than in reducing school budgets. Still the passage of the measure…

A survey of one-third of Pennsylvania's school district superintendents and of the firms that conducted the mandated independent audits of their districts provided data revealing variables that accounted for differences in auditing costs among districts, suggesting factors that school business officials might consider when seeking cost reductions.…

Regression analysis on cost and expenditure data from 616 Ohio school districts indicates that districts in high wage areas respond to higher resource costs by reducing salaries and student-teacher ratios and by raising tax rates. State and federal aid does not fully offset the higher resource costs. (Author/RW)

Discusses the use of program cost analysis to identify cost differentials among educational programs that receive categorical state and federal funds. Using data from a recent Illinois study, calculates cost-per-pupil differentials among 22 special education programs and 18 vocational education programs. (JG)

A study of all K-12 Nebraska school districts compared 1974-75 data with 1981-83 data and found increasing differentiation among districts in both expenditures and tax base per pupil, decreasing differentiation in property tax rates, and no change in differences in teacher salaries. (RW)

A survey of special education in 45 smaller school districts in Idaho gathered data on disabled and gifted students, district size, program costs per pupil, grade level, student hours in special education, and type of delivery system (including self-contained, resource room, work study, and homebound systems). (RW)

Analysis of 1976-78 data on rural Ohio school districts found that of six fiscal and demographic variables (geographic size, children with special needs, fiscal capacity, tax effort, total revenues, and excess staff over state minimum requirements), none could distinguish financially troubled from untroubled districts. (RW)

This article studies the effects of earmarking state lottery profits for education. Because educational expenditures generally exceed the funds earmarked for education by a wide margin, nothing prevents state legislators from using earmarked funds to replace rather than augment funds that would have gone to education in the absence of earmarking.…