Choice without consciousness: Women's participation in household decisions and gender equality in children's education

Arbeitspapier

In this paper, we test if households where women participate in decisions regarding children's education and allocation of household education budgets incur more equal expenditures on education of boys and girls. Moreover, we test if women's awareness of gender equality can reduce inequality between boys and girls at the household level. We estimate these effects using three rounds of longitudinal data of rural households in Pakistan. We use both household and year fixed effects to control for endogeneity of the dependent and explanatory variables. The results suggest that households where women participate in decisions regarding children's education spend higher shares of education expenditures on education of girls in the secondary school age group (11-16). The results of Heckman Selection Model, corroborated by an estimated logit model, suggest that in households where women participate in children's education decisions and where women are aware of gender equality in education, girl children are more likely to be enrolled in school. The paper contributes to the refinement of measures of women's empowerment and to understanding of the mechanisms to achieve gender equality in education.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: ZEF Discussion Papers on Development Policy ; No. 290

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Household Behavior and Family Economics: Other ; Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement ; Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
• Subject: empowerment ; inequality ; gender ; household decision-making ; intra-household resource allocation

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Saleemi, Sundus ; Kofol, Chiara
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): University of Bonn, Center for Development Research (ZEF)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2020

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/213466
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET