Trauma at School: The Impacts of Shootings on Students' Human Capital and Economic Outcomes

Abstract

We examine how shootings at schools-an increasingly common form of gun violence in the United States-impact the educational and economic trajectories of students.Using linked schooling and labor market data in Texas from 1992 to 2018, we compare within-student and across-cohort changes in outcomes following a shooting to those experienced by students at matched control schools.We find that school shootings increase absenteeism and grade repetition; reduce high school graduation, college enrollment, and college completion; and reduce employment and earnings at ages 24-26.We further find school-level increases in the number of leadership staff and reductions in retention among teachers and teaching support staff in the years following a shooting.The adverse impacts of shootings span student characteristics, suggesting that the economic costs of school shootings are universal.

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