Intergenerational Wealth Mobility in Rural Bangladesh

Unique residential history data with retrospective information on parental assets are used to study household wealth mobility in 141 villages in rural Bangladesh. Regression estimates of father-son correlations and analyses of intergenerational transition matrices show substantial persistence in wealth even when we correct for measurement errors in parental wealth. We do not find wealth mobility to be higher between periods of a person's life than between generations. We find that the process of household division plays an important role: sons who splinter off from the father's household experience greater (albeit downward) mobility in wealth. Despite significant occupational mobility across generations, its contribution to wealth mobility, net of human capital attainment of individuals, appears insignificant. Low wealth mobility in our data is primarily explained by intergenerational persistence in educational attainment.intergenerational inequality, household wealth, occupational mobility, schooling mobility, transition matrix, Bangladesh

Returns to education in Bangladesh

This paper reports labour market returns to education in Bangladesh using data from recent nationwide household survey. Returns are estimated separately for rural and urban samples, males, females and private sector employees. Substantial heterogeneity in returns is observed; e.g. estimates are higher for urban (than rural sample) and female samples (compared to their male counterparts). Our ordinary least square estimates of returns to education are robust to control for types of schools attended by individuals and selection into wage work.Education, labor market participation, sample selection, Bangladesh

Poisoning the Mind: Arsenic Contamination of Drinking Water Wells and Children's Educational Achievement in Rural Bangladesh

Bangladesh has experienced the largest mass poisoning of a population in history owing to contamination of groundwater with naturally occurring inorganic arsenic. Prolonged drinking of such water risks development of diseases and therefore has implications for children's cognitive and psychological development. This study examines the effect of arsenic contamination of tubewells, the primary source of drinking water at home, on the learning outcome of school-going children in rural Bangladesh using recent nationally representative data on secondary school children. We unambiguously find a negative and statistically significant correlation between mathematics scores and arsenic-contaminated drinking tubewells at home, net of the child's socio-economic status, parental background and school specific unobserved correlates of learning. Similar correlations are found for an alternative measure of student achievement and subjective well-being (i.e. self-reported measure of life satisfaction), of the student. We conclude by discussing the policy implication of our findings in the context of the current debate over the adverse effect of arsenic poisoning on children.subjective well-being, Madrasa, drinking water pollution, Bangladesh

Inequality of Educational Opportunity in India: Changes over Time and across States

This paper documents the extent of inequality of educational opportunity in India spanning the period 1983-2004 using National Sample Survey (NSS) data. We build on recent developments in the literature that has operationalized concepts in the inequality of opportunity theory (including Roemer's) and construct three indices of inequality of educational opportunity using data on an adult sample. Irrespective of the index used, the state of Kerala stands out as the least unequal in terms of educational opportunities. However, even after excluding Kerala, significant inter-state divergence remains amongst the remaining states. Transition matrix analysis confirms substantial inter-temporal mobility in inequality of opportunity across Indian states. Rajasthan and Gujarat in the West and Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the Centre experienced large-scale fall in the ranking of inequality of opportunities. However, despite being poor, Eastern states of West Bengal and Orissa made significant progress in reducing inequality of opportunity. At a region level, Southern, North-eastern and Eastern regions on average experienced upward mobility (i.e. decline in inequality of opportunity) whilst the Central region experienced downward mobility. We conclude by examining the link between progress towards equality of opportunity and poverty reduction, growth and a selection of pro-poor policies.schooling mobility, dissimilarity index, Gini of opportunity index, overlap index

Social interactions and student achievement in a developing country : An instrumental variables approach

This paper identifies endogenous social effects in mathematics test performance for eighth graders in rural Bangladesh using information on arsenic contamination of water wells at home as an instrument. In other words, the identification relies on variation in test scores among peers owing to exogenous exposure to arsenic contaminated water wells at home. The results suggest that the peer effect is significant, and school selection plays little role in biasing peer effects estimates.Tertiary Education,Education For All,Teaching and Learning,Primary Education,Secondary Education

Madrasas and NGOs : complements or substitutes ? non-state providers and growth in female education in Bangladesh

There has been a proliferation of non-state providers of education services in the developing world. In Bangladesh, for instance, Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee runs more than 40,000 non-formal schools that cater to school-drop outs from poor families or operate in villages where there's little provision for formal schools. This paper presents a rationale for supporting these schools on the basis of their spillover effects on female enrollment in secondary (registered) madrasa schools (Islamic faith schools). Most madrasa high schools in Bangladesh are financed by the sate and include amodern curriculum alongside traditional religious subjects. Using an establishment-level dataset on student enrollment in secondary schools and madrasas, the authors demonstrate that the presence of madrasas is positively associated with secondary female enrollment growth. Such feminization of madrasas is therefore unique and merits careful analysis. The authors test the effects of the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee primary schools on growth in female enrollment in madrasas. The analysis deals with potential endoegeneity by using data on number of the number of school branches and female members in the sub-district. The findings show that madrasas that are located in regions with a greater number of Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee schools have higher growth in female enrollment. This relationship is further strengthened by the finding that there is, however, no effect of these schools on female enrollment growth in secular schools.Primary Education,Tertiary Education,Education For All,Gender and Education,Teaching and Learning

Farm Productivity and Efficiency in Rural Bangladesh: The Role of Education Revisited

This paper reassesses the debate over the role of education in farm pro duction in Bangladesh using a large dataset on rice producing hous eholds from 141 villages. Average and stochastic production frontier functions are estimated to ascertain the effect of education on productivity and efficiency. A full set of proxies for farm education stock variables are incorporated to investigate the 'internal' as well as 'external' returns to education. The external effect is investigated in the context of rural neighborhoods. Our analysis reveals that in addition to raising rice productivity and boosting potential output, household education significantly reduces production inefficiencies. However, we are unable to find any evidence of externality benefit of schooling. We discuss the implication of these findings for rural education programs in Bangladesh.Agriculture, returns to education, stochastic production frontier, Bangladesh, Labor and Human Capital, Productivity Analysis, I21, Q12, N5,

Poisoning the mind : arsenic contamination and cognitive achievement of children

Bangladesh has experienced the largest mass poisoning of a population in history owing to contamination of groundwater with naturally occurring inorganic arsenic. Continuous drinking of such metal-contaminated water is highly cancerous; prolonged drinking of such water risks developing diseases in a span of just 5-10 years. Arsenicosis-intake of arsenic-contaminated drinking water-has implications for children's cognitive and psychological development. This study examines the effect of arsenicosis at school and at home on cognitive achievement of children in rural Bangladesh using recent nationally representative school survey data on students. Information on arsenic poisoning of the primary source of drinking water-tube wells-is used to ascertain arsenic exposure. The findings show an unambiguously negative and statistically significant correlation between mathematics score and arsenicosis at home, net of exposure at school. Split-sample analysis reveals that the effect is only specific to boys; for girls, the effect is negative but insignificant. Similar correlations are found for cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes such as subjective well-being, that is, a self-reported measure of life satisfaction (also a direct proxy for health status) of students and their performance in primary-standard mathematics. These correlations remain robust to controlling for school-level exposure.Education For All,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Environmental Economics&Policies,Tertiary Education,Urban Solid Waste Management

Work-Life Balance Practices and the Gender Gap in Job Satisfaction in the UK: Evidence from Matched Employer-Employee Data

This paper examines the role of work-life balance practices (WLB) in explaining the “paradox of the contented female worker”. After establishing that females report higher levels of job satisfaction than men in the UK, we test whether firm characteristics such as WLB and gender segregation boost the satisfaction of women proportionately more than that of men, thereby explaining why the former are reportedly happier. The results prove that WLB practices increase the likelihood of reporting higher satisfaction but similarly for both demographic groups thereby reducing the gender gap in job satisfaction only slightly. Still, the results indicate that WLB practices at the forefront of worker welfare policy improve the wellbeing of the workforce. Experiments with firm-fixed effects allowed by the matched dimension of the data reveal that firm effects are relevant but they only explain a half of the gender gap in job satisfaction, suggesting that the other half may be due to individual heterogeneity.job satisfaction, work-life balance practices, gender segregation, matched employer-employee data

Returns to Education in Bangladesh

This paper reports labour market returns to education in Bangladesh using national level household survey data. Returns are estimated separately for rural and urban samples, males, females and private sector employees. Substantial heterogeneity in returns is observed; e.g. estimates are higher for urban (than rural sample) and female samples (compared to their male counterparts). Our ordinary least square estimates of returns to education are robust to control for types of schools attended by individuals and selection into wage work.