Child schooling, child health and rainfall shocks: evidence from rural Vietnam

We study the effect of early life conditions, proxied by rainfall shocks, on schooling and height in rural Vietnam. Our measure of rainfall shock is defined as deviations from the long-run average. Many Vietnamese rural dwellers engage in rain-fed crop production, mostly irrigated paddy rice. Sufficient annual rainfall could play an important role in the harvest and thus, the household income. Nutritional deficiencies resulting from the household's income shocks may have negative consequences on health. We find that a negative rainfall shock during gestation delays school entry and slows progress through school. In addition, a negative rainfall shock in the third year of life affects adversely both schooling and height. The effects differ by region in ways that reflect differing constraints on families that are shaped by regional economic heterogeneity. We predict that policies that help rural families smooth income shocks will result in increases in human capital and in substantial cumulative returns in productivity over the life course.Vietnam, child nutrition, early childhood, school enrollment

"The Effect of Child Health on Schooling: Evidence from Rural Vietnam"

We study the relationship between long term child health and human capital. Child health may suffer if a child is inadequately nourished or is exposed to disease early in life and this may affect subsequent accumulation of human capital. We use data from rural Vietnam to examine the impact of child health on delay in starting school and schooling progress taking into account that choices of families affect children’s health and schooling. Our instrument is early life rainfall shocks that have differential effects arising from regional economic diversity. Our estimates indicate that better child health results in meaningfully improved schooling outcomes.child health, z-score, school entry delay, schooling gap, rainfall shocks, Vietnam

A Nested Logit Migration Model with Selectivity.

The author specifies a multiple discrete-choice migration model with a correction for selectivity in wage equations, and applies a less restrictive technique for modeling multiple discrete choices than in previous studies of migration. The author estimates the model using Venezuelan microdata, and finds evidence of positive selection in some state wage equations. This suggests that migration decisions are made according to the principle of comparative advantage. Evidence is also found of unobserved similarities between some states of Venezuela such that individuals regard them as neither perfectly distinct nor perfect substitutes. Copyright 1987 by Economics Department of the University of Pennsylvania and the Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association.

"A Quantile Regression Analysis of Wages in Panama."

I investigate differences in the effects of worker characteristics on wages in Panama at different points of the conditional wage distribution. Public sector employment increases wages of men and of women relatively more at lower quantiles. Public sector employment increases wages of the median worker in that sector and reduces wage inequality within the sector. The existence of a labor union at a worker’s workplace increases relatively more wages of men at lower quantiles. Labor unions reduce male wage inequality within the union sector and increase average wages of union members. Unions do not increase women’s wages but reduce wage inequality within the union sector. Working for a large firm increases wages relatively more at lower quantiles. Rates of return to higher education and to experience are larger for men at higher quantiles. Experience and higher education increase men’s wage inequality. There are no differences across quantiles in rates of return to schooling and experience for women.wages, Panama, quantile regression

Migration and Wages of Young Men

We specify a two-period nested logit migration model with selectivity. We estimate the model using a sample of young male workers and study their choices among the nine U.S. census divisions during the first two years after leaving fulltime schooling. We find evidence of the existence of unobserved similarities in the divisions within each census region. We find that locational choices in one period affect locational choices of individuals in subsequent periods. We test for selectivity in division-specific wage equations and find little evidence of selectivity in the wage equations of most divisions and evidence of negative selection in the wage equations of two divisions.

Survey Attrition and Schooling Choices

We use data from three cohorts of the National Longitudinal Surveys of Labor Market Experience and from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to study the effect of survey attrition on estimates of statistical models of schooling choices. We estimate regressions using data on people who always respond to the surveys (stayers) and on people who miss some surveys (attritors) and test whether the same statistical model describes the behavior of stayers and attritors. In general (with a few exceptions) we find that attrition either has no effect on the regression estimates or only affects the estimates of the intercept (and sometimes the coefficients of birth year dummies) and does not affect estimates of family background slope coefficients.

Schooling Choices and Demographic Cycles

This paper examines the effect of demographic cycles on schooling choices and the timing of school completion. Utilizing data from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Labor Market Experience and from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we find that men and women born during the upswing of a demographic cycle obtain more schooling and take longer to finish a year of schooling than comparable individuals born during the downswing of a demographic cycle. The patterns that we document are more complex than would be predicted by any of the theoretical models of educational responses to demographic cycles that have been presented in the literature.