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I am happy to announce my research brief, "A$19-billion Blind Spot: State Pension Spending," with Bob Costrell & Collin Hitt is now available at https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.3102/0013189X20912754
@AERA_EdResearch @ERjournal_AERA @ua_edreform @umsl @UMSLLead #pensions
@AERA_EdResearch @ERjournal_AERA @ua_edreform @umsl @UMSLLead #pensions
"we examine an important but obscure form of state spending on K–12 education—state subsidies of school district pension costs. In 2018, this exceeded $19 billion across 23 states. To put that amount into perspective, 2018 federal spending on Title I programs was $15.8 billion."
"In the first comprehensive tabulation of these data, we show that this subsidy can be as much as $2,400 per pupil, as it is in Connecticut. In Illinois, it comprises an additional 56% of state spending on K–12 on top of all formula and categorical aid."
The important thing to note here is that these funds have been largely ignored and often not reported. NCES has begun efforts to include the data and you may see some significant spikes in state education spending in the next round of data.
You may be interested in this thread/paper. @SchlFinance101 @biggsag @CoryKoedel @RebeccaSibilia @edweek @chalkbeat @The74 @ChadAldeman @matt_barnum @mlueken2 @MargueriteRoza @jbmcgee
