Intergenerational effect of education reform: mother's education and children's human capital in Nepal

We examine a potential intergenerational transfer of human capital by investigating the effect of maternal education on children's educational and labor outcomes in the context of a developing country Nepal. To account for endogeneity of mother's education, we use education reform in the 1970s that had differential impact on women due to their year and district of birth. We also account for birth order effects by implementing a triple-difference strategy. The education reform increased schooling of females that were most affected by the reform. Furthermore, an increase in mother's highest level of schooling increased the child's probability of finishing 5th grade only among mothers from a higher caste households. We find modest effects of mother's education on child labor outcomes, with the IV estimate indicating that a year increase in mother's education reduces a child's weekly work by approximately an hour. A lack of intergenerational impact among relatively lower caste households suggests that exclusionary social structure should be considered when promoting maternal education as a medium to improve children's well-being.