Schooling of girls and boys in a West African country: the effects of parental education, income, and household structure

Abstract

In this paper we investigate gender differences in the determinants of several schooling indicators—grade attainment, current enrollment, and withdrawal from school—in a poor urban environment in West Africa, using ordered and binary probit models incorporating household-level random effects. Increases in household income lead to greater investments in girls' schooling but have no significant impact on schooling of boys. Improvements in father's education raises the schooling of both sons and daughters (favoring the latter) but mother's education has significant impact only on daughters' schooling; these estimates are suggestive of differences in maternal and paternal preferences for schooling daughters relative to sons. Domestic responsibilities, represented for example by the number of very young siblings, impinge strongly on girls' education but not on boys'. Policies such as subsidized childcare that reduce the opportunity cost of girls' time in the home may therefore increase their ability to get an education. JEL 015, I21