The Influence of Finance Policies on Charter School Supply Decisions in Five States

Abstract

This paper tests if charter school finance policies influence charter school location. I create a theoretical framework describing the location incentives created by charter school finance provisions and test their relevance empirically by applying a two-step approach consisting of negative binomial models and Wald tests. Using data from New York, North Carolina, Florida, Michigan, and Ohio, I provide evidence that states’ finance provisions are an important policy lever impacting charter school location. Several robustness checks corroborate the initial results.