<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>The 1970s witnessed violent, widespread, and highly-politicized student protests in Turkey. Small protests turned into bloody street clashes, the death toll exceeded 5,000, and a military coup came in—which resulted in mass arrests. The universities were at the center of violent conflict. We study the education and labor market consequences of this political turmoil on the cohorts exposed to educational disruptions. First, we document that the number of new admissions and graduates in post-secondary education declined significantly due to the turmoil. The decline in post-secondary graduation ratio is 6.6 percentage points for the exposed individuals. Second, we estimate a counterfactual wage distribution for the exposed cohorts and check whether the turmoil affected their wage and occupation distributions. We show that the decline in educational attainment pushed the exposed population toward medium- and low-income occupations, and compressed their wages toward the minimum wage. Finally, we use the unexpected decline in post-secondary education as an instrument to estimate returns to college. We find that the college-premium is around 15 percent per year for men.</p>
</abstract>

The 1970s witnessed violent, widespread, and highly-politicized student protests in Turkey. Small protests turned into bloody street clashes, the death toll exceeded 5,000, and a military coup came in—which resulted in mass arrests. The universities were at the center of violent conflict. We study the education and labor market consequences of this political turmoil on the cohorts exposed to educational disruptions. First, we document that the number of new admissions and graduates in post-secondary education declined significantly due to the turmoil. The decline in post-secondary graduation ratio is 6.6 percentage points for the exposed individuals. Second, we estimate a counterfactual wage distribution for the exposed cohorts and check whether the turmoil affected their wage and occupation distributions. We show that the decline in educational attainment pushed the exposed population toward medium- and low-income occupations, and compressed their wages toward the minimum wage. Finally, we use the unexpected decline in post-secondary education as an instrument to estimate returns to college. We find that the college-premium is around 15 percent per year for men.

The revolution is dead, long live the demolition: Education and labor market consequences of student riots

IZA Journal of Labor Economics

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

The 1970s witnessed violent, widespread, and highly-politicized student protests in Turkey. Small protests turned into bloody street clashes, the death toll...

The revolution is dead, long live the demolition: Education and labor market consequences of student riots

Published Online: Dec 04, 2023

Page range: -

Received: Dec 27, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2023-0004

Keywords
Student protests, political conflict, tertiary education disruptions, returns to college

© 2023 Ahmet Ozturk et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

The revolution is dead, long live the demolition: Education and labor market consequences of student riots

Published Online: Dec 04, 2023

Page range: -

Received: Dec 27, 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajole-2023-0004

KeywordsStudent protests, political conflict, tertiary education disruptions, returns to college

© 2023 Ahmet Ozturk et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Keywords
Student protests, political conflict, tertiary education disruptions, returns to college