66 M.L. Walden, Z. Sogutlu Economics of Education Review 20 2001 63–70
SUPP5f[COL or FMR, EDU, EXP, FEM, SECOND, PUPTCH, ASST, SCHSIZE,
READING, REV, PERCAPY]. The variable definitions are given in Table 1. The
dependent variable, SUPP, the local teacher salary sup- plement, is explained more fully in the next section.
3. Data
The intrastate teacher salary model is implemented with data from North Carolina for the 1993–94 school
year. The salary and other educational information are taken for public schools only. Private and home schools
educate less than 6 of North Carolina pupils North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, Division of
Non-Public Education, 1998.
Local markets are defined as counties. There are 100 counties in North Carolina. There are 129 public school
districts in the state. Two-thirds of these districts are sin- gle-county districts. No district crosses county lines. For
multi-district counties, data for one district were formed by taking a pupil-weighted average of the multiple dis-
tricts.
Public school teachers in North Carolina are paid from two sources, the state and the local county government.
The state pays a ‘base’ salary dependent on the teacher’s education and experience levels. The local county
government pays a supplement to this base salary. The dependent variable in our study, SUPP, is the local
county salary supplement. This means the impacts of teacher education and experience through the state base
salary are removed. Teacher education and experience will influence SUPP only if local governments place
additional value on these two characteristics.
Teacher education EDU is measured as the percent- age of teachers in the district with a post-baccalaureate
degree. Teacher experience is measured by the average years of teaching experience EXP. The variables
SECOND, PUPTCH,
ASST, SCHSIZE,
and GRADRT are measured for the school district. The vari-
ables FEM, REV, and PERCAPY are measured for the county.
8
Sources and descriptive statistics for the variables are given in Table 1. Note that the ACCRA-based cost-of-
living index for North Carolina counties is a relative measure that has no intrinsic meaning.
8
Note that PERCAPY is measured in nominal terms, rather than deflated by the cost-of-living measure to be expressed in
real terms. This is done for comparability to previous studies, where dollar amounts are in nominal terms.
4. Results
