Schooling and Parental Death

Abstract


Loss of a parent is one of the most traumatic events a child can face. If loss of a parent reduces investments in children, it can also have long-lasting implications. This study uses parametric and seminonpara-metric matching techniques to estimate how one human capital investment, school enrollment, is affected by a parent's recent death. We analyze data from 600,000 households from Indonesia's National Socioeconomic Survey (Susenas) during 1994–1996. We find a parent's recent death has a large effect on a child's enrollment. We also use this shock to test several theories of intrahousehold allocation and find little differential treatment based on the gender of the child or the deceased parent.



Gertler Paul Levine David I Ames Minnie | source: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY 401 |
Categories: Sociology Education


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