IESET.
Hypotheses·fiscal·education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel

Public education spending reduces inequality or improves intergenerational mobility only when housing-cost burden is low.

SUPPORTEDengine/runs/education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel

SUPPORTED — coef=-0.5887 (sign matches claim -), p=0.0211

confidence cueThis is a clear pass for the claim as written. It still applies only to this sample, period, and method.

policy briefNeeds review

In ordinary language

Do children have a better shot at moving up when schools, housing, and neighborhoods give them access to opportunity, rather than simply because a country redistributes more income?

plain answer

The data clearly moved in the predicted direction. coef=-0.5887 (sign matches claim -), p=0.0211

why it matters

This matters because fiscal claims should change belief only when they survive a pre-declared empirical test.

how the test works

It compares 1 country or place units from 1990 to 2024, using a panel fe design, with fixed effects for country and year.

what was measured
What changed
  • Education spending share
What we checked
  • Inequality index
what this does not prove

A single test is not the whole truth. It narrows the claim under a specific sample, time period, and method. Strong policy conclusions need the pattern to survive nearby tests, alternative data, and serious objections.

verification

No evidence packet has been generated yet.

Results

engine/runs/education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel
1007550250199020072024GLOBAL
illustrative sketch · run pending
No coefficients yet. When the model fires, this chart will show gini_index across 1 sampled countries over 1990–2024.
The shapes above are stylised — none of the lines are real data.
Placeholder for education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel. Published chart will be generated from engine/runs/education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel/chart_data.json.

Who has skin in the game — schools predicting on this

17 schools list this hypothesis as a test of their position. The chips below are school-level scoreboard outcomes, not a second hypothesis verdict.

hypothesis verdict vs scoreboard outcome

The banner verdict judges this hypothesis as written. The scoreboard asks whether each school's polarity-corrected prediction was right. Raw status is not a school win: SUPPORTED supports schools that needed SUPPORTED, but refutes schools that needed REFUTED.

Austrian Business Cycle Theory (ABCT)wins if REFUTEDschool refutedChicago School Monetarismwins if REFUTEDschool refutedClassical Liberalwins if REFUTEDschool refutedDegrowth / Ecological Macroeconomicswins if MIXEDpartial/no-callDemocratic Socialism (Bernsteinian revisionism + modern)wins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedStructuralist / Developmentalistwins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedEco-Socialism / Red-Greenwins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedEmpirical Pragmatist (the framework's house position)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callNew Institutional Economicswins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarket Socialism (Lange-Lerner tradition)wins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarxian Political Economywins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedMarxism-Leninism (central-planning implementation)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callModern Monetary Theorywins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedNew Keynesian (mainstream synthesis)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callOrdoliberalism (Freiburg School)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callPost-Keynesianwins if SUPPORTEDschool supportedSocial Democraticwins if SUPPORTEDschool supported

Pre-registration

registration ordering unverified
first-spec commit 4c8ce8e · 2026-07-18T22:11:21Z
run generated · 2026-06-29T17:52:20Z
Run timestamp predates this path's first git-add commit (rebase, rename, or pre-git local run). Spec hash is still the path's first-add commit — not repository HEAD — but ordering is not a clean pre-registration proof.

Public education spending reduces inequality or improves intergenerational mobility only when housing-cost burden is low.

Falsification criterion — what would disprove this

set before the run · honoured after

This hypothesis is considered falsified if:

SUPPORTED if the primary treatment coefficient has the pre-registered - sign at p<=0.10 with minimum sample gates. REFUTED if the coefficient has the opposite sign at p<=0.10. Otherwise PARTIAL; missing data or failed sample gates are INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING.

formal test & threshold
test:      panel_fe_education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel
threshold: [object Object]

Method

Template
panel_fe
Fixed effects
country, year
Clustering
country
Sample
1 countries · 1990 – 2024
Evidence type
associational

Alias-batch panel fixed effects screen. The proxy source is explicitly local and runnable, but exact policy semantics should be upgraded before scoreboard conversion.

Data

VariableSourceTransform
gini_index
outcome
world_bank_wdi:SI.POV.GINItier 2
level
education_spending_share
treatment
world_bank_wdi:SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZStier 2
level_lagged_one_year
log_gdp_pc
control
world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.KDtier 2
log
trade_openness
control
world_bank_wdi:NE.TRD.GNFS.ZStier 2
level
government_effectiveness
control
wgi:GE.ESTtier 4
level

● ready  · ● pending  · ● reconstruct-needed

Detailed result card

Result card — education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel

Verdict: SUPPORTED — coef=-0.5887 (sign matches claim -), p=0.0211

Pre-registration

  • Claim: Public education spending reduces inequality or improves intergenerational mobility only when housing-cost burden is low.
  • Falsification rule: SUPPORTED if the primary treatment coefficient has the pre-registered - sign at p<=0.10 with minimum sample gates. REFUTED if the coefficient has the opposite sign at p<=0.10. Otherwise PARTIAL; missing data or failed sample gates are INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING.
  • Falsification test: panel_fe_education_spending_inequality_mobility_panel

Estimate

  • Method: linearmodels.PanelOLS
  • Coefficient (treatment): -0.5887
  • Std error: 0.2549
  • p-value: 0.0211
  • Observations: 1197, countries: 118
  • Within R²: 0.131
  • Fixed effects: entity=True, time=True
  • Clustering: country

Variables resolved

  • world_bank_wdi:SI.POV.GINI → gini_index (outcome, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=2430)
  • world_bank_wdi:SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZS → education_spending_share (treatment, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=6235)
  • world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.KD → log_gdp_pc (controls, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=12104)
  • world_bank_wdi:NE.TRD.GNFS.ZS → trade_openness (controls, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=10714)
  • wgi:GE.EST → government_effectiveness (controls, publisher=wgi, n=5168)

Generated by scripts/run_panel_fe.py at 2026-06-29T17:52:20+00:00

Strongest opposing argument

Every hypothesis ships with its charitable opposing argument. The framework earns credibility by handling objections at their strongest, not weakest.

Notes

Source shard: engine/audits/swarm_2026-05-22_200_hypotheses_worker_D_sectoral_data_rich.md. Backlog source families: OECD education finance, OECD IDD, OWID mobility, OECD housing.. Alias proxy used: world_bank_wdi:SE.XPD.TOTL.GD.ZS -> world_bank_wdi:SI.POV.GINI. Initial promotion pass left scoreboard mapping empty; mapped by the 2026-05-22 swarm scoreboard conversion v1. v2 wiring: Added Eurostat NUTS2 education attainment and poverty panels as regional-level evidence for education-mobility link.

Authored framework. Read the transparency note.