Impact of access to water and sanitation services on educational attainment

Abstract

Children are prone to the contagion of waterborne diseases without adequate water and sanitation services. When not sick, children and their caregivers without proper access to such services have to allocate their leisure time in order to meet their water and sanitation needs. It is through these health and leisure time use changes that access to water and sanitation services impacts the educational attainment of children. This paper proposes a household utility maximization model in which access and sanitation services determine the child's health, which in turn affects the child's education and the household welfare. Comparative statics indicate that households consider the health gains to the market value of their leisure time, and the changes in the consumption of other goods. The model is applied to data from Brazil. In order to sort out the endogeneity between provision of water and sanitation services, and educational attainment, the paper uses an instrumental approach, based on the technical features of the water systems and an instrument that measures a proxy of water availability within the municipality territory. Estimates suggest that access to water and sanitation services has a positive and significant effect on schooling, when measured by the completed number of school years. These positive effects call for the expansion of the laggard sewerage systems in the country, both at home and at school.