David E. Sahn

Schooling of girls and boys in a West African country: the effects of parental education, income, and household structure

This study investigates gender differences in the determinants of several schooling indicators in Conakry, Guinea, using ordered and binary probit models incorporating household-level random effects. Such indicators include grade attainment, current enrollment, and withdrawal from school. The survey, which was conducted on 1725 households, contains detailed information on a wide range of socioeconomic factors such as education, labor force activity and earnings, assets and health. Results indicate that increases in household income lead to greater investments in the schooling of girls than in the schooling of boys. Meanwhile, improvements in the education of fathers raise the schooling of both sons and daughters, while the education of mothers only has a significant impact on the schooling of daughters. These estimates show differences in maternal and paternal preferences for schooling daughters relative to sons. Therefore, the importance of gender, parental education, and household income and composition affect the education of children. However, findings also show that education for girls is unnecessary since they only need to work at home. Moreover, policies that raise household incomes will increase gender equity in schooling, which will also depend on whether and how these policies change the opportunity costs of girls and boys and the labor market returns to female and male schooling.

The effects of human capital on wages, and the determinants of labor supply in a developing country☆

Abstract The Heckman procedure is used to correct for sample selection bias in estimating wage offer and net labor market supply equations. The findings show that wages are affected by education and experience. In addition, the wage offer is influenced by other genetic and environmental influences captured in the wage of ones father. Calories, as predicted by exogenous instruments, are also shown to influence the wage offer, suggesting that better nutrition increases labor productivity. The probability of market labor participation as well as the amount of net market labor supply declined with the size of paddy landholding, in addition to the net market supply elasticity increasing with the amount of land owned, and being lower for urban than rural workers.

Decomposing world health inequality

This study explores global inequality in health status and decomposes it into within- and between-country inequality. We rely on standardized height as our health indicator since it avoids the measurement pitfalls of more traditional measures of health such as morbidity, mortality, and life expectancy. It also avoids measurement problems associated with using monetary variables such as income or expenditure across time or place to compare welfare. Our calculation of world height inequality indicates that, in contrast with similar research on income inequality, within-country variation is the source of most inequality, rather than the differences between countries.

Structural adjustment reconsidered : economic policy and poverty in Africa

Acknowledgements List of tables List of figures 1. Introduction 2. Poverty in Africa 3. Trade and exchange rate policy reforms 4. Fiscal policy 5. Agriculture and food markets Conclusion Notes Appendix References.

Gender and Education Impacts on Employment and Earnings in West Africa: Evidence from Guinea

This study uses household survey data to analyze the determination of sector of employment and earnings of men and women in a low income, African urban center. Earnings function for men and women are estimated to identify the roles of schooling, experience, and other factors in determining earnings in different sectors of the labor market.

On the determinants of nutrition in Mozambique: The importance of age-specific effects

The literature indicates mixed results regarding the impact of income and other variables on the age and gender standardized height-for-age of children. This paper uses data from Maputo, Mozambique to show that the impact of household resources or health inputs may be masked if diverse age groups are aggregated. For example, increases in household incomes affect only the nutritional status of children two years of age and older. Conversely, for younger children, but not the older ones, mothers education is a significant determinant of anthropometric measures of nutritional status. This implies that education and efforts to improve childcare practices can be targeted to mothers of younger children, but that these children will not achieve improved linear growth from income-support programs, unlike older children.

Progress Toward the Millennium Development Goals in Africa

We analyze demographic and health surveys to examine the progress of African countries in achieving six of the seven millennium development goals (MDG) set forth by the United Nations. Our results paint a discouraging picture. Despite some noteworthy progress, the evidence suggests that, in the absence of dramatic changes in the rates of improvement in most measures of living standards, the MDG will not be reached for most indicators in most countries. The results are particularly sobering for rural areas, where living standards are universally lower, and where rates of progress lag behind urban areas.

The Effect of Price and Income Changes on Food-Energy Intake in Sri Lanka

Data is used to analyze the food acquisition behavior of households from a 1980/81 survey designed to be nationally sectorally and regionally representative of Sri Lanka. The poor are shown to be much more responsive to price and income changes than other income groups. The urban population generally exhibits lower income elasticities of demand for food commodities. The poor appear to efficient substitutors thereby mitigating the effects of a price change on caloric intake. The important exception is rice whose elasticity of calorie consumption with respect to price was about 4 times higher than for any other commodity. The reluctance of households to substitute for rice even when faced with rising prices coupled with its large budget share show rice to be the most important consumption good. Higher rice prices are an important determinant of poverty for landless and urban workers. Moderating food prices preferably through technological change is a key ingredient to raising consumption among the poor. Simulations show that even if there are rapid and proportional increases in expenditures of all income groups this will not dramatically increase caloric intake among the poor. However if the absolute value of the increase in real expenditures were distributed equally to all households there would be a marked increase in the % of households consuming an adequate diet.

Parental Preferences for Nutrition of Boys and Girls: Evidence from Africa

This article models the determinants of pre-school age malnutrition in Africa using the Demographic Health Surveys. By examining the differences in the impact of mothers and fathers education on the nutrition of boys and girls, we draw inferences from our reduced-form equations regarding the existence of non-unified preferences. In a bargaining framework, women with more schooling are able to earn more, which improves their fallback position. Thus, we test whether mothers schooling has a larger impact on daughters than sons nutrition, and whether fathers education favors sons nutrition. Using classical testing criteria, we generally find that preferences of fathers and mother differ in regard to the health of boys and girls.

A General Equilibrium Analysis of the Effect of Macroeconomic Adjustment on Poverty in Africa

Using CGE models for four countries (Cameroon, The Gambia, Madagascar, and Niger), this paper examines the consequences of macropolicy reform on real incomes of poor households in sub-Saharan Africa. The simulations suggest that, compared to alternative policy options, trade and exchange rate liberalization tends to benefit poor households in both rural and urban areas - as rents on foreign exchange are eliminated, demand for labor increases, and returns to tradable agriculture rise. The small magnitudes of the gains in average real incomes of poor household groups modeled suggest that macropolicy reform alone will not be sufficient in the short run to significantly reduce poverty in Africa.