The Impact of Intergovernmental Grants on Educational Expenditure

Abstract

In this paper we assess the impact of intergovernmental grants on educational spending. First we discuss the theoretical effects of different types of grants. Next we present the general features and findings of 40 published works from the past two decades within this theoretical frame-work. We highlight the studies for the specific problems they set out to analyze, the models constructed, and the statistical procedure used. Finally, based on the review of these studies, we provide some approximate estimates of the impact on educational spending of categorical grants, matching grants, block grants, and general revenue sharing grants. We also discuss some of the conceptual and statistical issues involved in assessing the impact of intergovernmental grants on educational spending.