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Income shocks and gender gaps in education: Evidence from Uganda

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  • Björkman-Nyqvist, Martina

Abstract

This paper uses exogenous variation in rainfall across districts in Uganda to estimate the causal effects of household income shocks on children's enrollment and academic performance conditional on gender. I find negative deviations in rainfall from the long-term mean to have negative and highly significant effects on female enrollment in primary schools and the effect grows stronger for older girls. I find no effect of rainfall variation on the enrollment of boys and young girls. Moreover, I find that when schooling is free of charge and both marginal boys and girls are enrolled, a negative income shock has an adverse effect on the test scores of female students while boys are not affected. The results imply that households respond to income shocks by varying the amount of schooling and resources provided to girls while boys are to a large extent sheltered — a finding consistent with a model where parents' values of child labor differ across sexes.

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  • Björkman-Nyqvist, Martina, 2013. "Income shocks and gender gaps in education: Evidence from Uganda," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 237-253.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:105:y:2013:i:c:p:237-253
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2013.07.013
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    Cited by:

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    2. Esther Gehrke & Friederike Lenel & Claudia Schupp, 2023. "COVID-19 Crisis, Economic Hardships, and Schooling Outcomes," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 18(3), pages 522-546, Summer.
    3. Sen, Kritika & Villa, Kira M., 2022. "Rainfall shocks and adolescent school-work transition: Evidence from rural South Africa," 2022 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Anaheim, California 322383, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    4. Bernal, Carolina & Vlaicu, Razvan, 2023. "Child Labor, Rainfall Shocks, and Financial Inclusion: Evidence from Rural Households," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 13008, Inter-American Development Bank.
    5. Le, Kien & Nguyen, My, 2021. "In-utero Exposure to Rainfall Variability and Early Childhood Health," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    6. Tafere, Kibrom & Srivastava, Bhavya & Behrer, Arnold P., 2024. "Temperature and Learning Outcomes: Evidence from Ethiopia," 2024 Annual Meeting, July 28-30, New Orleans, LA 343693, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    7. Flatø, Martin & Kotsadam, Andreas, 2014. "Droughts and Gender Bias in Infant Mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa," Memorandum 02/2014, Oslo University, Department of Economics.
    8. Chan, Jeff & Karim, Ridwan, 2023. "Oil royalties and the provision of public education in Brazil," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    9. Kalliyil, Muneer & Sahoo, Soham, 2024. "Does Restricting Access to Credit Affect Learning Outcomes? Evidence from a Regulatory Shock to Microfinance in India," IZA Discussion Papers 17404, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Jaah, Mkupete & Fintel, Dieter von & Burger, Ronelle, 2021. "Maize Price Shock, Agriculture Production and Children Nutrition Outcomes in Tanzania," 2021 Conference, August 17-31, 2021, Virtual 314974, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    11. Zou, Wei & Cheng, Bo, 2023. "Can rural health insurance coverage improve educational attainment? Evidence from new cooperative medical scheme in China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 689-704.
    12. Andrew D. Foster & Esther Gehrke, 2017. "Start What You Finish! Ex Ante Risk and Schooling Investments in the Presence of Dynamic Complementarities," NBER Working Papers 24041, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Susmita Baulia, 2018. "Is household shock a boon or bane to the utilisation of preventive healthcare for children? Evidence from Uganda," Discussion Papers 121, Aboa Centre for Economics.
    14. Costa, Francisco J M & Goldemberg, Diana, 2024. "Too Hot to Learn? Evidence from High School Dropouts in Brazil," OSF Preprints apu6j, Center for Open Science.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Rainfall; Education; Test scores; Gender;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D1 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • D13 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Household Production and Intrahouse Allocation

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