econ of mm final paper - blogs.brown.edu

Does Access to Spanish-‐Language Television Affect Educational Outcomes for Hispanics in the US?

Jake Levine Brown University

December 2014

Abstract

In the past 50 years, the number of Latin American immigrants in the US has been rapidly growing. As the Hispanic American share of the population is expected to continue to rise, any policies relating to the assimilation of Hispanics will increase in importance. As Hispanics continue to make up a greater share of the media consumption market, Spanish-‐language television has become more prevalent. While the short-‐term private welfare of Hispanic consumers is raised by the availability of Spanish-‐language television, it is not clear how this affects the eventual assimilation and outcomes of first generation Hispanic immigrants in mainstream American society. In this paper, I use graduation rates as a measure of future labor market success for Hispanics. I find that graduation rates of Hispanic immigrants and those who rely most heavily on Spanish decrease by 5 to 10 percentage points in areas where there is access to Spanish-‐language local news (a measure of incremental access to Spanish-‐language television). Thus, my results indicate a net negative effect of the availability of Spanish-‐language on the assimilation of Hispanics, particularly first-‐generation immigrants and all those who rely most heavily on Spanish.

2

I. Introduction:

With the Hispanic population in the US becoming a larger and larger share of

the population, policies that affect Spanish-‐speakers will increase in importance

(see Figure 1). There has already been much debate surrounding bilingual education

in public schools. The arguments for and against bilingual education are very similar

to those surrounding Spanish-‐language television. These arguments can also be

thought of as the competing effects of having access to Spanish-‐language TV. On one

hand, Spanish-‐language TV can increase the ability of Hispanics to assimilate by

more effectively stimulating them and keeping them in the loop with current events

in American society. On the other hand, it can decrease the ability for Hispanics to

assimilate by promoting the continued use of Spanish instead of English, the more

valued language in the US labor market. Understanding which effect outweighs the

other is important as more and more Latin American immigrants filter into the

United States.

Many Hispanics in the US rely heavily on Spanish. This is particularly

pronounced in first generation Hispanic immigrants (see Figure 2). This trend holds

when analyzing Hispanic television-‐watching behavior. 28 percent of Hispanics

watch TV mostly in Spanish, and 40 percent of first generation Hispanic immigrants

watch TV mostly in Spanish (see Figure 3). This highlights the importance of

understanding the effects of Spanish-‐language television.

With this in the backdrop, I plan to analyze the effect of Spanish-‐language

television on the assimilation of Hispanics through analyzing High School

graduation rates. Level of educational attainment is very indicative of how an

3

individual will succeed in the labor market. In terms of income level and

unemployment rate, there is a marked difference between those who complete high

school and those who do not (See Figure 4). Furthermore, Hispanics graduate at

lower rates than all other demographic groups besides Blacks (See Figure 5). For

these reasons, graduation rate is a good measure of assimilation for Hispanics.

I aim to find how differing levels of access to Spanish-‐language television

affect Hispanic graduation rates. My data on Spanish-‐language television measures

the availability of Spanish-‐language local news in metropolitan areas (MSAs) from

1994-‐2002. While all individuals in the sample have access to some form of Spanish-‐

language TV, looking at Spanish local news availability offers insights on

incremental gains in access. It is incremental in terms of exposure, meaning it may

attract more viewers compared to a Spanish-‐language TV station without it, and

incremental in terms of content, meaning it offers a new form of Spanish-‐language

TV consumption even for those who already watch. In controlling for demographic

characteristics and using metropolitan area and birth cohort fixed effects, I aim to

isolate the effect of incremental gains in access to Spanish-‐language TV on the high

school graduation rate of Hispanic-‐Americans. I find that Spanish-‐Language local

news availability does not affect the graduation rate of American-‐born Hispanics. I

find that it does, however, have a 5-‐10 percent negative affect on the graduation rate

of first generation Hispanics and those that rely most heavily on Spanish.

As far as I know, there is no previous literature examining the relationship

between Spanish-‐language TV and any measure of Hispanic assimilation. There is

related research, however, about similar relationships. One paper by Waldfogel and

4

Oberholzer-‐Gee, Media Markets and Localism: Does Local News en Español Boost

Hispanic Voter Turnout? (which I got some of my data from) examines the

relationship between Spanish-‐language local news and voting behavior. This paper

finds a positive relationship between the two. Another body of literature focuses on

the effects of television in childhood on academic achievement. Shapiro and

Gentzkow analyze this relationship in their paper entitled: Preschool Television

Viewing and Adolescent Test Scores: Historical Evidence from the Coleman Study. They

find a positive relationship between preschool TV watching and test scores. Finally,

there is much related research on bilingual education. One such study by Chin,

Daysal, and Imberman is called: Impact of Bilingual Education Programs on Limited

English Proficient Students and Their Peers: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from

Texas. This study finds that bilingual education has weak positive effects on the

standardized test scores of non-‐LEP, non-‐Spanish home language students and no

effects on Spanish home language students.

This paper proceeds in five sections. Section II provides detail on the data

used in the study. Next, I will outline the specific methods I used to answer the

research question. In section IV, I will present the results and findings of my

empirical techniques. Section V will be a discussion about the limitations of my

findings. Finally, I will conclude the paper with a short overview and an outline of

the key takeaways.

5

II. Data:

As I mentioned above, the major source of my data was the Waldfogel and

Oberholzer-‐Gee paper. Their data included the availability of Spanish-‐language local

news in 165 MSAs across the US. The local news broadcasts they used were

branches of either Telemundo or Univision, the two national Spanish-‐language

television stations. Their data set included exposure in the years 1994 through

2002. Of the 165 MSAs in their data set, I had to omit 25 from my data for two

reasons. First, some of the MSAs they used did not include data from the whole time

range. Second, the government changed the coding system for MSAs in 2011. Some

MSAs were no longer included on the list, and I had to get rid of some for this

reason.

I obtained education and demographic data from the American Community

Survey (ACS). I accessed this data through IPUMS. The variables I pulled from the

ACS include educational attainment, age, race/ethnicity, gender, immigration status,

English Speaking ability, and MSA. I was interested in the educational attainment of

19-‐21 year-‐olds instead of just 19 year-‐olds because this increased the sample size. I

was not able to any older than 21 because then they would have been born to early,

and I would not be able to include them in the earliest years for which I have data on

local news availability.

I used age 9 as the age of interest in terms of exposure to Spanish-‐language

local news. I used this age because if I went any younger, the people that would have

had access in 2002 would not have graduated high school by 2013 (the last year of

available data), and if used an older age than 9, some of the people that would have

6

had access in the earlier years of my data range would have graduated high school

before 2005 (the first year ACS data was collected). Exposure at age 9 will serve as a

proxy for exposure during childhood. It also is a reasonable age when a child may

begin to notice local news and pay any attention to it.

Below are some summary statistics from the sample. Table 1 gives the

general demographic make-‐up. The higher minority representation in the sample is

due to the fact that my dataset only includes individuals in metropolitan areas. Table

2 shows high school graduation rates (rates include GEDs because that’s what ACS

data was available) for different groups in my sample.

Table 1: Demographic Statistics Males 51.0%

Hispanics 18.0%

Non-‐Hispanic Whites 58.4%

Non-‐Hispanic Blacks 14.7%

Immigrants 12.1%

Do not speak English or do not speak English well 2.6%

Do not speak English or do not speak English well if Hispanic 10.6%

Note: Table shows demographic characteristics of the average of the 140 MSAs in my sample. Statistics are computed from the American Community Survey.

7

Table 2: High School Graduation Rates (Including GEDs)

Note: This table shows graduation rates by demographic group for students in the 140 MSAs in my sample. Statistics are computed from the ACS survey.

The strength of this data is that it offers a way to identify causality by

isolating the MSAs that switched over to having access to Spanish-‐language local

news. A weakness, however, is that my data only covers an eight-‐year span. Due to

the short time range, only 11 MSAs out of the 140 in my sample actually switched

over to having access. A second major weakness is that my data only includes access

to Spanish-‐language local news. Instead of analyzing the effect of Spanish-‐language

TV on assimilation, I am analyzing the effect of an incremental gain in access to

Spanish-‐language TV on assimilation. I will talk about this idea further in the

8

discussion section. Finally, Waldfogel and Oberholzer-‐Gee only used the even

numbered years in the 1994-‐2002 range, because they were only interested in

election years. I assumed that there were no changes in access to Spanish-‐language

local news in the odd numbered years. I believe the only effect it will have on my

results is to lose a small level of precision.

III. Empirical Strategy I am interested in determining whether the availability of Spanish-‐language

local news affects graduation rates. The simple way to answer this question is to run

a regression of the availability of Spanish-‐language news on high school graduation.

(1) Gicm = (S-‐L News)cmβ1 + Xiβ2+ μm + λc + eicm

In this regression, Gicm denotes a dummy for whether or not individual i in birth

cohort c in metro area m graduated high school. S-‐L Newscm is a dummy indicating

whether or not there was Spanish-‐language local news for birth cohort c in metro

area m. Xi contains characteristics of the individual, μm represents metro area fixed

effects, λc represents birth cohort fixed effects, and eicm is the error term. The fixed

effects hold constant fixed characteristics, observable and unobservable, of markets

and time over this period. I am assuming the error term is uncorrelated with S-‐L

News [co(S-‐L News, e) = 0].

The problem with this model is that it does not isolate the effect of having

Spanish-‐language local news on the outcomes of Hispanics, the group we are

interested in. In order to solve this, we can estimate using the following model:

(2) Gicm = (S-‐L Newscm*Hispanici)β1 + (S-‐L News)cmβ2 + Xiβ3 + μm + λc + eicm

9

In Regression 2, the key independent variable is an interaction between the

Spanish-‐language local news dummy and a Hispanic dummy. This allows me to

isolate the effect of having access to Spanish-‐language local news and being Hispanic

on high school graduation rate.

While this is much closer to the relationship I want to identify, this approach

still does not allow for analyzing the effect of Spanish-‐language local news on

different types of Hispanics. Figures 2 and 3 demonstrate that first generation

immigrants both rely more on Spanish and on Spanish-‐language TV. The below

regressions factor in this information:

(3) Gicm = (S-‐L newscm*hispanici*immi)β1 + (S-‐L news)cmβ2 + Xβ3 + μm + λc + eicm

(4) Gicm = (S-‐L newscm*hispanici*noeng)β1 + (S-‐L news)cmβ2 + Xβ3 + μm + λc + eicm

For each of these regressions, the key righthand variables are triple interactions.

Each captures very similar aspects of the Hispanic population. Regression 3 isolates

the effect of having Spanish-‐language news and being a first generation immigrant

on graduation rate. Regression 4 isolates the effect of having Spanish-‐language news

and being a Hispanic American who either speaks no English or does not speak

English well. Each of these are getting at the point that Hispanics who are first

generation immigrants or who rely most heavily on Spanish are the ones who

should be affected the most by the incremental gain in access to Spanish-‐language

local news.

There is one key assumption on which this approach rests. I am assuming

that the introduction of Spanish-‐language local news is not correlated with any

other variables that may be changing in the metropolitan areas. This seems to be a

10

reasonable assumption, as the likely factor driving the adoption of Spanish-‐language

local news is expanding market of Hispanics. Finally, the standard errors are

calculated by clustering at the metropolitan area level. This corrects for correlated

residuals across observations within metro area.

IV. Results The regression outputs from all four regressions are included in Table 3

below.

Table 3: Regression Outputs

Note: All models have birth cohort and metropolitan area fixed effects. Controls include gender, race/ethnicity, age, immigrant status, and English speaking ability. Demographic data is from American Community Survey and data on Spanish-‐language local news availability from Waldfogel and Oberholzer-‐Gee (2009). All standard errors are calculated using clustering at MSA level. * = significant at 90% level ** = significant at 95% level *** = significant at 99% level

11

For regression (1), the key coefficient on the Spanish-‐language local news dummy

yields a value not statistically different from zero. The coefficient is slightly positive

at 0.010, but with a standard error of 0.008, it is clear that we cannot determine an

effect in either direction. This is not surprising, considering Spanish-‐language news

availability should not necessarily affect the likelihood of graduating high school for

all different types of students

Regression (2), which measures the aggregate Hispanic effect of the

availability of Spanish-‐language local news on high school graduation, also yields an

estimate not statistically different from zero. The coefficient on the interaction

between Spanish-‐language local news and Hispanic is -‐0.009, with a standard error

of 0.009. This indicates that there is no detectable affect of Spanish-‐language local

news availability on the likelihood of graduating high school for Hispanics overall.

Based on language usage and TV watching habits (as outlined in Figures 2

and 3), regression (3) should yield the most interesting results, because first-‐

generation immigrants rely most heavily on Spanish and Spanish-‐language TV. The

key independent variable in this regression is a triple interaction between Spanish-‐

language local news access, whether or not an individual is Hispanic, and whether or

not an individual is an immigrant. The coefficient on this variable is -‐0.063,

statistically significant at the 99 percent confidence level. In other words, Hispanic

immigrants living in MSAs with Spanish-‐language local news availability are 6.3

percent less likely by to attain a high school degree.

Regression (4) gets at a similar idea to regression (3). Instead of looking at

how Spanish-‐language local news availability affects outcomes for Hispanic

12

immigrants, it looks at how it affects Hispanics that cannot speak English at all or

speak English well. The key independent variable is a triple interaction capturing

this. The coefficient on this variable is -‐0.086, statistically significant at the 99

percent confidence level. This means that for Hispanics that cannot speak English

well or at all, the availability of Spanish-‐language local news has an 8.6 percent

negative effect on their likelihood of graduating high school.

In each of my models, the R2 values are consistently right around 8 percent.

While this low value may typically be somewhat of a concern, the fact that the

dependent variable is a dummy variable explains this. The scatter plot can only have

two possible values for the dependent variable, high school graduation. Because of

the nature of this plot, it is impossible for a linear OLS model to explain a high

percentage of the variation in the data. For this reason, the low R2 is not a concern.

Below (Table 4) is a graph plotting high school graduation rate over time for

Hispanic immigrants. Each line represents a different level of access to Spanish-‐

language local news. The blue line represents the graduation rate for Hispanic

immigrants who had access to Spanish-‐language local news in all years in the time

range. The purple line represents Hispanic immigrants who had no access to

Spanish-‐language local news during the period. The red line represents those who

gained access in between 1994 and 1998, and the green line represents those who

gained access in between 1999 and 2002. Five MSAs gained access in the early

years, and six MSAs gained access in the late years.

13

Table 4: Hispanic Immigrants Graduation Rates by Spanish Local News Access

characthere This plot is somewhat erratic because of the small number of MSAs that

gained access during the period. The variability in the red and green lines can be

attributed to this. It is still possible, however, to see the general trend that

regression (3) is capturing. The red line in particular highlights how the gain in

access to Spanish-‐language local news in the early years of the time range caused

graduation rates to flatten out.

V. Discussion:

The first main issue with my research is that my measure of high school

graduation includes traditional high school degrees as well as GEDs. The ACS did not

begin differentiating between high school diploma types until 2008, and I required

graduation data from 2005-‐2013. For this reason, I was not able to use only

14

traditional high school degrees in my analysis. While this is not a huge cause for

concern, it may not be the most valuable outcome measure for one main reason:

GEDs are not as valuable in the economy compared to traditional degrees. While my

method still captures some level of assimilation, being able to differentiate the two

degrees would allow for a better of estimate of who will be able to succeed in the

labor market. Hispanics are slightly more likely to receive GEDs relative to other

groups in the population (NCES “Characteristics of GED Recipients in High School:

2002-‐06”).

A second main issue with my research is that I only measured exposure at

age 9 as a proxy for exposure during childhood. I was forced to pick age 9 as the

year for exposure because of limitations in the data availability. Exposure over time

is certainly a more accurate determinant of how Spanish-‐language TV will affect an

outcome. Furthermore, if we are forced to look at exposure for one age, it may be

the case that a different age is most influential in an individual’s outcomes.

The third and greatest issue with my research is that it measures the effects

of local news access instead of exposure to any type of Spanish-‐language television.

In my data, local news availability was determined by which branches of Univision

and Telemundo had a local news station. Because of this, everyone I look at in my

research had access to some form of Spanish-‐language television throughout the

period. It was only a matter of whether or not their Spanish-‐language channel had a

local-‐news program on it. In this way, my results show the effects incremental gains

in access to Spanish-‐language. Measuring the effects of exposure versus non-‐

exposure to Spanish-‐language television would yield more valuable results if we

15

truly want to identify the effects of any type of Spanish-‐language language television

on assimilation.

Given more time and resources, I would want to dive deeper into this

relationship by looking at the effects of having access to any type of Spanish-‐

language television. In order to do so, I would look into the introduction of Spanish-‐

language TV stations, such as Univision and Telemundo, into cable packages across

the country. I would use a broader time horizon for the data to offer the greatest

amount of identification. Aside from this, the analysis would be similar to the

analysis I’ve done with this data. I would use market and time fixed effects, control

for demographics and use interactions in order to identify which groups of

Hispanics are most likely to be effected by the availability of any type of Spanish-‐

language TV.

VI. Conclusion:

With Hispanics increasing as a share of the US population, any policy that

specifically relates to them will be increasingly important. Furthermore, their ability

to assimilate into the labor market will be crucial to the success of the US economy

as a whole. While there are existing bodies of research about bilingual education, a

contentious topic that influences this issue, there is no existing research on the

effects of Spanish-‐language TV availability.

By exploiting variation in the timing of introduction of local news programs

to existing Spanish-‐language TV stations, I found evidence that reliance on Spanish-‐

language TV has net-‐negative effects on the high school graduation rates of different

16

groups of Hispanics living in metropolitan areas in the US. For first-‐generation

Hispanic immigrants and Hispanics that rely heavily on Spanish, there is a 5 to 10

percent decrease in their likelihood of graduating high school. While intervening in

private markets is not a typical public response in the US, my research suggests that

decreasing the reliance of Hispanics on Spanish-‐language TV could have positive

effects on Hispanic Americans and the entirety of the US economy.

17

Appendix:

Figure 1: 2006 Projections of Hispanic Population

18

Figure 2: Hispanics’ Primary Language

Pew Research Center “http://www.pewhispanic.org/2012/04/04/iv-‐language-‐use-‐among-‐latinos/”

19

Figure 3: Hispanics’ TV Viewing Habits

Pew Research Center “http://www.pewhispanic.org/2012/04/04/iv-‐language-‐use-‐among-‐latinos/”

20

Figure 4: Earnings and Unemployment by Educational Attainment

Bureau of Labor Statistics. http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_chart_001.htm

Figure 5: School Year 2011-‐2012, Regular Diplomas (No including GEDs)

National Center for Educational Statistics. http://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_coi.asp

econ of mm final paper - blogs.brown.edu

Documents