Effects of male and female education on economic growth: Some evidence from Asia

We use extreme bounds analysis (EBA) to examine the comparative growth effects of gender disaggregated and level-specific enrolment ratios in a panel of Asian economies. To test our hypotheses, we employ both endogenous and exogenous growth frameworks. The externality effects of education are positive and robust for both males and females and are relatively large and significant at primary, secondary and tertiary levels. The results are suggestive of a gender productivity gap. Asian economies can grow faster by investing more in female education.     

Gender gap in school enrolment among youth in Lesotho

This article uses data from the 1996 population census of Lesotho and the Ministry of Education's annual reports compiled during the period 1990–9 to investigate the trend of the gap between male and female enrolment in schools and higher learning institutions. The study examines various education indicators, school enrolment and dropout rates. There is no doubt that the gender gap still exists in Lesotho in favour of females. Both the cohort analysis and the analysis of dropout rates have shown that there is gender imbalance in schooling. In addition, the analysis has shown that the gender gap has recently started to narrow in primary, secondary and high schools but is widening at tertiary level. The article recommends that the government of Lesotho should look closely at the issue of the disadvantaged ‘boy child’ if it intends to eliminate gender disparities in schools.     

Negative economic shocks and child schooling: Evidence from rural Malawi

This study investigates the impacts of negative economic shocks on child schooling in households of rural Malawi, one of the poorest countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Both individually-reported and community-level shocks are investigated. There is evidence that community-level shocks negatively impact the school enrolment of children. The point estimates suggest that this effect is larger when shocks and school enrolment are reported by men as compared with women. However, we cannot conclude with statistical confidence that the impact of idiosyncratic shocks is larger when reported by males than when reported by females. Similarly, although the point estimates suggest that the impact of community-level shocks on the school enrolment of children is larger than that of idiosyncratic shocks, we cannot conclude with statistical significance that the impacts of community-level and idiosyncratic shocks are different.     

Intergenerational education transmission in China: The gender dimension

This paper explores gender differences in intergenerational patterns of education attainment in China. Using the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) survey for 2016, we find that intergenerational ‘persistence’, as reflected in high regression and correlation coefficients between an individual's and their parents' education levels, is higher for females than males for the entire sample and for each of four age cohorts. This result stems primarily from the relative lack of upward mobility among females from families with low levels of education, as confirmed by a series of educational mobility matrices and a multinomial logistic regression analysis. The results offer novel insights into gender differences in the unequal transmission of education across generations, with significant implications for gender inequality more broadly in Chinese society.     

Une modélisation des déterminants des décisions de scolarisation primaire des ménages au Sénégal

Abstract: This study describes enrolment rates and constructs an econometric model for primary education demand in Senegal, relying on the results of the QUID survey realized in 2001. A sequential probit model is constructed to explain the different choices made by the households in relation to their children's education, namely: decision to enrol or not, choice of the type of school (public or private schools, if private, religious or secular schools), decision to allow the children to attain the last grade or not. A dozen of explanatory variables relating to children and households’ characteristics and availability of education supply, are retained in this model. Simulations based on the model estimation results show the discrimination endured by rural children compared to urban ones whatever their gender, and by girls relative to boys, in terms of the probability distribution of the dependant variable of the model.     

How Sensitive is the Demand for Primary Education to Changes in Economic Factors?

During the recession in the 1970s and 1980s in less-developedcountries in general and in Zambia in specific, private costsof schooling increased and school quality deteriorated. Combinedwith poverty, these changes may have damaged the demand forprimary education. This observation motivated a study of therelationship between economic variables and the demand for primaryeducation. A binary choice model for the school enrolment decisionis estimated, and the relevance of economic incentives concerningthe decision to enrol in school is tested directly. Economicincentives to enrol in school are reflected in household income,educational expenses and quality indicators, and the resultsshow that they all affect school enrolment as expected, eventhough the magnitudes of the effects are relatively moderate.     

Determinants of Indonesian rural secondary school enrolment: gender,neighbourhood and school characteristics

In recent years the school enrolment rates of children aged 13–15 and 16–18 years have increased sharply in Indonesia, not only in urban but also in rural areas. Using various data sets spanning the years from 1993 to 2007, this paper investigates changes in factors associated with the enrolment of secondary school aged children in rural areas. It sheds light on the roles of gender and of neighbourhood and school characteristics, which have rarely been examined in the Indonesian context. The study finds that the disappearance of a gender gap in secondary enrolments between 1993 and 2007 contributed significantly to the rise in the overall enrolment rate. The findings also show that children living in wealthier communities and communities with a high proportion of enrolled children are more likely to attend school. Finally, various school characteristics are shown not to be strongly or consistently correlated with school enrolment.     

How corruption diminishes the effectiveness of public spending on education in Indonesia

This paper takes advantage of a regional corruption measure to assess the impact of corruption on the effectiveness of public spending in the education sector in Indonesia, one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Two sets of outcomes are considered: school enrolment rates and school performance in national examinations. Public spending appears to have a negligible effect on school enrolment in highly corrupt regions, but a statistically significant, positive and relatively large effect in less corrupt regions. In contrast, public spending has no significant effect on school performance. The main lesson from this paper is that pouring more public funds into the education system is unlikely to bring about improvement unless it is accompanied by efforts to improve governance in the sector.     

Conditional Cash Transfer and School Outcomes: An Evaluation of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program in Davao Oriental,Philippines

The present study adds to the empirical literature examining the effects of conditional cash transfers on school outcomes. Using school‐level and student‐level enrolment data from Davao Oriental Philippines, we evaluate the influence of the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (also known as 4Ps), a social development policy program, on the growth rates in school enrolment outcomes. The findings show that 4Ps, on average, increased school enrolment of children by 1.12 percent. It was also apparent that using student‐level data as opposed to school‐level data revealed a more robust effect of 4Ps on school outcomes. We also found some school and socioeconomic characteristics influencing the change in school enrolments. Finally, this study highlights the role of government intervention programs in improving access to education in the poorest sector of the economy.     

Parental Education and Children's School and Work Status in Urban Ethiopia: A Note on Gender Bias

This paper examines gender bias in the parental education–child status link using data from urban Ethiopia. Gender bias is defined here, specifically, as the differential impact of a parent's education on a child's status depending on the gender of the parent vis‐à‐vis the child. Children's status is measured by school enrolment and participation in market work. Results from a basic model point to same‐gender bias – father–son, mother–daughter in school enrolment and father–son in market work. In an extended model, results show that father–son bias in market work may be particularly pertinent for middle‐ to later‐born children. Policy interventions should be mindful of such differential effects, particularly if the aim is to address persistent gender disparities in children's status.     

Rates of return to education of blacks in South Africa

The aim of this empirical study was to calculate private and social rates of return to education and to test the hypothesis that education is a major determinant of earning differentials for blacks in South Africa. Data for 23 278 working men and women were extracted from the 1985 Current Population Survey files. This comprised a sample representative of the black population in the Republic of South Africa excluding the former Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda and Ciskei territories. Lifetime earnings profiles were constructed from these data for five educational levels, namely, no schooling up to Standard 1; Standards 2 to 4; Standards 5 to 7; Standards 8 to 9; and Standard 10. Schooling was assumed to account for 60 per cent of the earnings differentials between these profiles. Imputed average household outlays on schooling were taken as the private direct cost of education. These were supplemented by estimates of per pupil spending by the various government departments responsible for black education, to calculate the social costs per year of primary and secondary schooling. Indirect costs in the form of imputed foregone earnings were included from Standard 5 (age 15) onwards. The private internal rates of return to education of males were found to be about 16 per cent at primary level and 24 per cent for secondary schooling. Corresponding social rates of return are about 6 per cent for primary and 15 per cent for secondary education. Estimates for females showed negative rates of return between no schooling and Standards 2 to 4, the private and social rates being estimated at ‐1 per cent and ‐4 per cent respectively; from Standards 2 to 4 to Standards 5 to 7, a private rate of 12 per cent and a social rate of 4 per cent are reported; and for the remaining secondary school phases private rates of about 32 per cent and social rates of about 15 per cent are estimated. The study confirms that education is a major determinant of earnings differentials and education expansion can be regarded as a powerful earnings equaliser.     

Effects of gender on the performance of micro and small enterprises in Malawi

Women are increasingly venturing into ownership of micro and small enterprises, either on their own or in partnership with male entrepreneurs. Using national survey data from Malawi, this study compares the performance of enterprises owned by females with those owned by males. The results show that the relationship between gender and business performance is complex. While there are no significant differences in profit margins, female-owned enterprises tend to grow more rapidly in terms of employment than male-owned ones. Gender-based regression results also show that while there are common factors that affect the performance of both kinds of enterprise, there are also differential effects in which education is a critical factor for the success of female-owned enterprises.     

Can public policies lower religiosity? Evidence from school choice in France, 1878–1902

This study analyses the effects of public policies on religiosity by focusing on the enrolment of pupils in French Catholic primary schools between 1878 and 1902. During this period, the government increased public spending and made school attendance free and mandatory until the age of 13. The empirical analysis presented here suggests that greater public spending had no substantial effect on the enrolment in Catholic schools. By contrast, mandatory schooling laws had a negative, but quantitatively limited, impact. The overall resilience of Catholic schooling is traced to the political divide created by the 1789 French Revolution.     

A note on the demand for enrollment in higher education

Summary This paper extends the basic Markov-chain, transition-proportions model by considering human capital investment behavioural variables. The demand for enrolment in higher education is expressed as a function of tuition, income and relative wages of graduates. According to the empirical results the hypothesis cannot be rejected that high school graduates are investment oriented in their decision to enrol to college.     

Enrolment for degrees in agriculture and implications for agricultural development∗

The proportion of students who enrol for agricultural degrees at black universities??? is low, and only a few females enrol for these degrees. This has severe implications for agricultural development in the less developed areas. In order to increase enrolment for degrees in agriculture, it is suggested that improvements be made in the following: the society's image of agriculture, salaries of qualified agriculturalists, land tenure, vocational guidance at schools, quality of teaching of agriculture at schools, provision of bursaries and availability of jobs for agricultural graduates.     

Youth wage employment and parental education in Malawi

This paper looks at the relationship between the likelihood of being in regular wage employment and parental education for Malawian youth. It uses data from the third integrated household survey (IHS3). Only a mother's education is found to have a statistically significant effect on the likelihood of being in regular wage employment for young females and males. It is established that the effect of a mother's education on young males is significantly larger than that for young females. The paper also finds that, regardless of gender, a mother's education complements/reinforces the positive effect of a youth's own education on the probability of being in wage employment. The evidence from this paper points to the existence of an intergenerational poverty trap; with children of uneducated mothers or mothers with low education finding themselves outside regular wage jobs.     

Changes over time in the return to education in urban China: Conventional and ORU estimates

Studies of the return to education in urban China have reported that this has increased over time, and that females typically have a higher return than males. In this paper we adopt a framework provided by the over education/required education/under education literature, and the decomposition developed by Chiswick and Miller (2008), to investigate the reasons for these findings. The finding by Chen and Hamori (2009), from analysis of data for 2004 and 2006, of the return to schooling for males exceeding that for females, is also examined using this decomposition.     

Rural–urban differences in parental spending on children's primary education in Malawi

Using Malawian data, this paper answers two interrelated questions: are there rural–urban differences in the factors that influence the probability that a household spends or does not spend on own children's education; and are there rural–urban differences in the factors that affect educational expenditure if a household decides to spend? Computed elasticities indicate that spending on education by rural households is more sensitive to changes in income compared with urban households, suggesting that spending on education in rural areas is a luxury good. In both areas, a mother's employment and education has a larger impact on spending compared with those of a father. Urban households compared with their rural counterparts are more sensitive to the quality of access to primary schools. We find no evidence of gender bias in school spending in urban areas, but rural households exhibit bias in favour of boys.     

Private rates of return to education of Africans in South Africa for 1995: a Double Hurdle model

In this study, the private rates of return to education of African males and females in South Africa are estimated. Both Heckman's (1976) two-stage selection model and the more recent Double Hurdle model, with correlated errors between the participation and employment equations, is found to be more suitable for the earnings analysis than the one with uncorrelated errors. This might imply that people make the decisions to participate in the labour force and to take up a job offer simultaneously. The private rate of return to education of Africans is found to be 12 and 11 per cent for males and females, respectively. These rates are significantly higher than those found in previous analyses of rates of return to education in South Africa. In these older studies, the private rate of return to education of Africans was found to vary from 2,5 to 7,7 per cent.     

The progress of school education in India

This paper provides an overview of school education in India.First, it places India's educational achievements in internationalperspective, particularly against countries with which it isnow increasingly compared, especially China. Second, the paperexamines schooling access in terms of enrolment and school attendancerates, and schooling quality in terms of literacy rates, learningachievement levels, school resources, and teacher inputs. Third,the paper investigates the role of private schooling in India,examining the extent of growth of private schooling and surveyingevidence on the relative effectiveness and unit costs of privateand public schools. Last, the paper discusses some major publiceducation initiatives. The concluding section suggests a futureresearch agenda and appeals for rigorous evaluation of the impactsand costs of the numerous existing educational interventions,in order to learn about their relative cost-effectiveness forevidence-based policy-making.