The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws

Daniel Hungerman

No 16973, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: For over a century, social scientists have debated how educational attainment impacts religious belief. In this paper, I use Canadian compulsory schooling laws to identify the relationship between completed schooling and later religiosity. I find that higher levels of education lead to lower levels of religious participation later in life. An additional year of education leads to a 4-percentage-point decline in the likelihood that an individual identifies with any religious tradition; the estimates suggest that increases in schooling can explain most of the large rise in non-affiliation in Canada in recent decades.

JEL-codes: I20 I28 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-lab and nep-soc
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Published as “The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws,” forthcoming at the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization

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Related works:
Journal Article: The effect of education on religion: Evidence from compulsory schooling laws (2014)
Chapter: The Effect of Education on Religion: Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Laws (2013)
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