Inequality of opportunity in education: the effect of circumstances on individuals education in Morocco

Abstract

This paper discusses the effect of inequality of opportunity on education in Morocco. Starting from an analysis of theoretical and empirical papers, we used the data from the National Survey on the levels of Living of Households 2006/07 to provide an estimation of the importance of these circumstances in education inequality in a country that has long suffered from inequality in education. We apply six circumstances variables which lie beyond the control of the individual father’s and mother’s education; gender; milieu; region of birth and expenditure and make an inequality of opportunity index using two methods. Then we decompose this index using Shapley decomposition. Our result show that a significant part of inequality in education access is due to inequality of opportunity, and the most important source of this inequality of opportunity is area of residence.