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Migration, Remittances and Human Capital Investment in Kenya

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  • Hines, Annie Laurie

    (University of California, Davis)

  • Simpson, Nicole B.

    (Colgate University)

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between international migration, remittances and human capital investment in Kenya. We use household level data from the 2009 Kenya Migration Household Survey (produced by the Africa Migration Project) to test our hypothesis and uncover a positive and significant relationship between the amount of international remittances a household receives and the amount of expenditures allocated to education (for all levels of education). We consider various robustness checks and find that our results hold up to various specifications, including an instrumental variable approach.

Suggested Citation

  • Hines, Annie Laurie & Simpson, Nicole B., 2018. "Migration, Remittances and Human Capital Investment in Kenya," IZA Discussion Papers 11835, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11835
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    15. Farai Jena, 2016. "The remittance behaviour of Kenyan sibling migrants," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 5(1), pages 1-19, December.
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    Cited by:

    1. Abdulloev Ilhom & Epstein Gil S. & Gang Ira N., 2020. "Migration and Forsaken Schooling in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan," IZA Journal of Development and Migration, Sciendo & Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 11(1), pages 1-27, January.
    2. Khraiche, Maroula & Boudreau, James, 2020. "Can lower remittance costs improve human capital accumulation in Africa?," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 42(5), pages 1000-1021.
    3. Md Shahadath Hossain & Adesola Sunmoni, "undated". "Do Remittances Influence Household Investment Decisions? Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," Economics Discussion Papers em-dp2021-04, Department of Economics, University of Reading.
    4. Chinenye Ifeoma Nwokolo & Matthew Ikechukwu Ogbuagu & Wakeel Atanda Isola, 2021. "Migrant’s remittance and investment financing nexus in Africa: Does investment climate matter?," Future Business Journal, Springer, vol. 7(1), pages 1-11, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    migration; remittances; human capital;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F24 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - Remittances
    • I25 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Economic Development
    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • O12 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

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