%0 Report
        %A García, Jorge Luis
%A Heckman, James J.
%A Leaf, Duncan Ermini
%A Prados, Maria José
        %T Quantifying the Life-Cycle Benefits of a Prototypical Early Childhood Program
        %D 2017
        %8 2017 May
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 10811
        %U https://www.iza.org/publications/dp10811
        %X This paper quantifies the experimentally evaluated life-cycle benefits of a widely implemented early childhood program targeting disadvantaged families. We join experimental data with non-experimental data using economic models to forecast its life-cycle benefits. Our baseline estimate of the internal rate of return (benefit/cost ratio) is 13.7% (7.3). 
We conduct extensive sensitivity analyses to account for model estimation error, forecasting error, and judgments made about the empirical magnitudes of non-market benefits. We examine the performance of widely used, ad hoc estimates of long-term benefit/cost ratios based on short-term measures of childhood test scores and find them wanting.
        %K childcare
%K rates of return
%K long-term forecasts
%K life-cycle benefits
%K early childhood education