Three essays on public economics issues of human capital

This dissertation consists of three essays exploring public economics issues of human capital. The first essay explores the effects of wage frictions on the quantity and quality of secondary school teachers. Using teacher level data from public, private, and charter schools I find that frictions such as salary schedules and collective bargaining agreements have significant effects on both teacher quality and class size and that these effects translate to significant effects on student achievement outcomes.;The second essay explores the effects of retirement migration and population aging on local public goods funding. A theoretical model is developed to examine how changing population demographics change the equilibrium sorting and median voter properties of residents in a community. An overlapping generations model with heterogeneous households is utilized to examine the potential effects of increased longevity on the level of education funding in a community. The model is calibrated to several cases and equilibrium properties are examined under various assumptions. I find that the effect of aging populations on education funding can be either positive or negative, depending on the size of the community and the retirement amenities that are present.;The third chapter analyzes the effects of increased longevity on growth and welfare in a multi-sector economy. An overlapping generations framework with separate health care, education, and consumption goods sectors is developed to examine the interaction between aging, saving, health expenditures, and human capital investment. I find that, through spillover effects in the health and education sectors, there are additional channels through which increased longevity can have positive effects on growth and human capital accumulation. The extent of these effects is shown to be sensitive to the subsidy level provided by the government in the health sector and the degree of privatization in the education sector.