Welfare Added? Optimal Teacher Assignment with Value-Added Measures

This research is the product of feedback and comments from many people including Garrett Anstreicher, Andrew Bacher-Hicks, Sandy Black, Ash Craig, Gordon Dahl, William Delgado, Itzik Fadlon, Julie Cullen, Amy Finkelstein, Yifan Gong, Jim Hines, Nathan Hendren, Caroline Hoxby, Peter Hull, Brian Jacob, Erzo Luttmer, Lars Lefgren, Ross Milton, Jonah Rockoff, Jesse Rothstein, Andrew Simon, Rich Patterson, Nolan Pope, and researchers at the Education Policy Initiative, Youth Policy Lab, and SANDERA, as well as with seminar and conference participants at the University of California, San Diego, the University of Michigan, Brigham Young University, the CAL Labor Summit, Boston University, the ASSA Annual Meetings, Simon Fraser University's Vancouver Applied Microeconomics Conference, NBER Education Spring Program Meeting, and NBER Public Spring Program Meeting. Thanks also to Andy Zau, who facilitated data access, and to Wendy Ranck-Buhr, Ron Rode, and others at the San Diego Unified School District for their interest and feedback. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research or Secretariat Advisors or its clients. Refine.ink was used to check the paper for consistency and clarity.

• January 28, 2026