School and neighborhood: residential location choice of immigrant parents in the Los Angeles Metropolitan area

This paper studies how immigrant parents value education for their children in the United States when making residential decisions. Parent valuation of education is examined through the differential effects of school quality on the residential location choices of households with and without children. The analysis relies on data from the 2000 Census and focuses on the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area. The results suggest that immigrant parents place a positive weight on school quality when choosing residences. The weight assigned to school is positively associated with household income and householder’s education. The paper further explores variation across immigrants to get at the potential economic mechanisms for differential valuation of school quality. Number of school-aged children in the household, selective migration, and potential returns to education may explain variation in the emphasis immigrant parents place on school quality in residential location choices.