Soil Endowments, Female Labor Force Participation, and the Demographic Deficit of Women in India

Eliana Carranza

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 2014, vol. 6, issue 4, 197-225

Abstract: Differences in relative female employment by soil texture are used to explain the heterogeneous deficit of female children across districts within India. Soil texture varies exogenously and determines the depth of land tillage. Deep tillage, possible in loamy but not in clayey soil textures, reduces the demand for labor in agricultural tasks traditionally performed by women. Girls have a lower economic value where female labor opportunities are fewer. Consistently, higher relative female employment in agriculture improves the ratio of female to male children in districts that have a smaller fraction of loamy relative to clayey soils.

JEL-codes: J16 J23 J43 O13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
Note: DOI: 10.1257/app.6.4.197
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (96)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/app.6.4.197 (application/pdf)
http://www.aeaweb.org/aej/app/data/0604/2012-0101_data.zip (application/zip)
http://www.aeaweb.org/aej/app/ds/0604/2012-0101_ds.zip (application/zip)
Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Soil endowments, female labor force participation and the demographic deficit of women in India (2012)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aea:aejapp:v:6:y:2014:i:4:p:197-225

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.aeaweb.org/journals/subscriptions

Access Statistics for this article

American Economic Journal: Applied Economics is currently edited by Alexandre Mas

More articles in American Economic Journal: Applied Economics from American Economic Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Michael P. Albert ().