Child Labor Bans, Employment, and School Attendance: Evidence from Changes in the Minimum Working Age

Abstract

Abstract This paper investigates the effect of a unique child labor ban regulation on employment and school enrollment. The ban, implemented in Mexico in 2015, increased the minimum working age from 14 to 15, introduced restrictions to employing underage individuals, and imposed stricter penalties for violation of the law. Our identification strategy relies on a DiD approach that exploits the date of birth as a natural cutoff to assign individuals into treatment and control groups. The ban led to a decrease in the probability to work by 1.2 percentage points, resembling a 16 percent decrease in the probability to work relative to the pre-reform mean, and an increase in the probability of being enrolled in school by 2.2 percentage points for the treatment group. These results are driven by a reduction in employment in paid work, and in the manufacturing and services sectors. The effects are persistent several years after the ban.