Essays on the Measurement and Origins of Inequality

This thesis contains three essays related to the measurement and origins of inequality. Thefirst two essays consider the Chicago public schools during the early 20th century. In the first essay, I evaluate the impact of school quality on child outcomes. Then I consider the impact of racial turnover on school funding. In the third and last chapter, I show how to adjust for effort when estimating latent skills from measures of academic performance.