Intergenerational effects of parental human capital on children: Evidence from Malawi

Youjin Hahn, Minji Kwak and Hyelim Son

Journal of Comparative Economics, 2025, vol. 53, issue 2, 345-372

Abstract: We investigate the intergenerational transmission of parental education on children’s outcomes in Malawi. Using the variations induced by the Free Primary Education reform implemented in 1994, we find that an extra year of mothers’ and fathers’ schooling increases children’s schooling years by 0.19 and 0.16 years, respectively. Children with more educated mothers are less likely to work, while no such evidence is found for children with more educated fathers. We examine an array of potential mechanisms, including assortative mating, reduced fertility, and improvements in family resources. We find that spousal quality, fertility response, and a narrower age gap between spouses may be the underlying channels for the intergenerational transmission of education.

Keywords: Child work; Education; Fertility; Human capital; Intergenerational transmission; Labor; Malawi; Marriage; Spouse quality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I28 J13 J22 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0147596725000204
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
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:eee:jcecon:v:53:y:2025:i:2:p:345-372

DOI: 10.1016/j.jce.2025.03.001

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Comparative Economics is currently edited by D. Berkowitz and G. Roland

More articles in Journal of Comparative Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().