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Using longitudinal data for Argentina, this paper estimates the labor supply reaction of spouses and children, as well as the interactions between them, following the job loss of their husband or father. The findings show that job loss by the household head has a positive and significant impact on the labor supply of other household members. However, it increases the likelihood of spouses to switch to informal and downgraded employment, and of children to drop out from education. While effects are stronger among vulnerable households, coverage of social security does not provide enough support in coping with unemployment shocks. Mothers' labor participation, however, may allow their daughters to continue their education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In about last three decades, many developing countries have experienced a large decline in maternal mortality rates. Global initiatives leading to better maternal health policies may have contributed to this decline. In this paper, we investigate whether maternal health intervention also improves the fetal survival rate. For this purpose, we consider the Village Midwife Program in Indonesia, which was launched in 1989 as a part of the safe motherhood strategy. Using the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS), we investigate the impact of midwives on fetal survival rate in terms of a change in the likelihood of a live birth being male. Our results show that the provision of a midwife in a community increases the probability of a live birth being male by about 3 percentage points. Greater antenatal care, skilled birth-attendance, and an improvement in nutrition among reproductive-age women—in terms of greater BMI—are the likely pathways. We do not find the results to be driven by pre-treatment trends, and they remain robust to a number of checks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Marriage frauds have reached a critical juncture as contract marriage becomes a modus operandi to reach the destination country. Contract marriage is an unwritten agreement or contract between two young potential migrant marriageable couples, i.e., bride and groom for achieving a common goal of international mobility. It is like a situation of the Stackelberg model, where one acts as a leader and the second follows him. In this situation, the bride acts as a leader due to her better quality of education and groom becomes the follower. The study concluded that the degree of the bride’s control over her marital decisions and choice of mate is more based on socio-economic status of the groom’s families than individual traits of the grooms. In contrast, the groom’s marital decisions and his choice of mate are determined only by the spouse’s quality of human capital formation. The study also shows that the role of social and economic networks is of paramount importance in facilitating and speeding up the flow of the contract marriages for migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper exploits the sharp escalation of violence in Colombia in the 1980s associated with the emergence of drug cartels to provide novel evidence on the long-run effects of violence exposure throughout the life-course, on children's educational attainment and academic achievement using administrative data. I find that, a higher homicide rate in early-childhood is associated with a higher probability of school dropout and conditional on completing high school, lower scores on a national end-of-high school exam. Results are robust to several falsification tests, and analyses of potential sources of selection bias. I provide supportive evidence that changes in fetal, child, and adolescent health outcomes are important potential mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates career trajectory and work locations of doctoral students trained in Macao and analyses how their career paths are shaped by perceived macro‐level factors. Respondents from four applied disciplinary areas were selected for semi‐structured in‐depth interviews. Research results show that doctoral students who graduated from Macao higher education institutions enjoy good career prospects in Mainland China. Their competitiveness in the research‐related job market benefits from having a multi‐level support system and a training mode that promotes government–university–industry collaboration. Policies and demand from industrial sectors are involved in students' learning experience through channels such as financial support, project collaboration and networks. Doctoral students in Macao are strategic planners and actors in leveraging their human capital. As Macao becomes an emerging destination for cultivating high‐level research labour, findings from this study capture a model of human capital formation in China's cross‐system context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the impacts of income inequality on life expectancy in African countries. The empirical analysis has been performed on a panel dataset of 52 African nations covering the period of 1995 to 2018. For estimating the inequality-health relationship, I have used Two-Stage Least Squares (2SLS) technique and a Panel Error Correction Model (PECM). The longrun cointegrating relationship was estimated using a Panel Dynamic Ordinary Least Square (PDOLS) estimator. The outcomes suggest that income inequality has negatively affected life expectancy at birth in the African continent overall. Though income inequality seems to have improved health in the short-run, in the long-run, income inequality had deleterious effects. A series of steps has been followed to check the soundness of the result of the main empirical examination and it is confirmed that the results are robust. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conditional Cash Transfers (CCTs) have become a key antipoverty policy in Latin America in the last 25 years. The ultimate goal of this kind of programs is to break the intergenerational transmission of poverty through the promotion of human capital accumulation of children in vulnerable households. In this paper, we explore this issue by estimating the long-run effects of the largest CCT in Latin America: the Brazilian Bolsa Familia. Through a combination of the two-stage-two-sample method and a difference-in-differences approach, we find evidence consistent with a positive long-run impact of Bolsa Familia among former beneficiaries. In particular, we find a significant positive effect on education and labor income, and a negative effect on the likelihood of being a current beneficiary of this social transfer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents new empirical evidence on the role of time trends in low pay persistence. We utilize population-wide tax records to track monthly labour market trajectories of initially low-paid workers. By performing age- and qualification-specific regressions, we find that low pay persistence reduces with time. However, the magnitude is highly heterogeneous across workforce characteristics. For a qualified worker in their early 20s, the risk of staying on low-pay declines by, on average, 5–10% points after one year. For a worker in their 50s, persistence remains almost unchanged regardless of their qualification level. We conclude that policy initiatives need to be more nuanced than a simple one-size-fits-all approach by accounting for time trends in low-pay persistence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the influence of human capital formation (HCF) on economic growth in Bangladesh based on an ARDL approach The outlay on health and government education spending each as a fraction of gross domestic product (GDP) is used as a proxy for HCF, while the growth rate of GDP is used to measure economic growth. The Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model and the Toda-Yamamoto (T-Y) Granger causality test are applied using time-series yearly data for the period 1990–2019 to accomplish the study. The ARDL estimation reveals that the variables are cointegrated. Expenditure on health influences economic growth rate positively in the long run, but not in the short-run, while government spending on education affects economic growth rate in the long run negatively, and in the short-run positively. The T-Y Granger causality test results reveal two unidirectional causalities: from health outlay to economic growth rate, and from education spending to economic growth rate, and hence, confirm the ARDL estimation results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Labour migration involves the transfer and flight of technical know-how and skills from one nation to another, to secure a better job and establish a new residence. It has consequences for the individual, the country of origin and the country of destination. Over the last decades, an increasing number of developed countries have put in place different mechanisms to encourage the immigration of only the most talented, skilled individuals from developing countries. A good example is the international visa lottery scheme. This scheme is put in place perhaps because developing countries cannot fully exploit the abilities and skills of human capital, as they do not have enough jobs to offer. Thus, Nigeria and other developing countries have become a human capitalgenerating machines for the developed world. It is an indisputable truism that labour migration has adverse effects ranging from social, cultural, and political to economic upon the emigrant's country. The thrust of this paper, therefore, is to examine the factors responsible for the flood of Nigerian migrants witnessed during the past couple of years. The dynamic consequences of labour migration and brain drain syndrome on human capital formation in Nigeria will be considered. Empirical studies have established the global net benefits of labour migration, but their findings are inconclusive about the impact migration has on the emigrant's country. Hence, the need for human capital formation in an emerging economy will also be addressed. Finally, the paper will offer policy recommendations to ensure immigrants' economic contribution to developing human capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: The hotel industry plays a crucial role in nations' economies, contributing significantly to economic growth through tourism. Therefore, it is imperative to use companies in the hotel sector as the unit of analysis, given their dedication to providing continuous services, making it attractive to contrast with the internal aspects of the company. Purpose: The study aimed to establish the association and correspondence between the service quality variables and organizational culture dimensions. Problem: A current challenge in the service sector, particularly in hotels, is the need for more information about the impact of organizational culture as a determinant of service quality. Methodology: The research adopted a quantitative correlational, cross-sectional, nonexperimental methodology. Theoretical and practical findings: The results indicated a significant relationship between the studied dimensions of culture, with a p-value of 0.000. The chi-square test was used to address the hypotheses. Additional cultural dimensions in the investigation model can be considered or expanded for future research prospects, focusing on objects of study in the service sector. Originality from the transdisciplinary and sustainable innovation point of view: This work significantly contributes to science by providing insights into how companies in such a crucial sector as the hotel industry prioritize the improved quality of life for their employees. The internal dimension of companies is examined, emphasizing that their interest goes beyond mere wealth generation, focusing on key individuals who ensure the smooth functioning of the machinery, i.e., the collaborators. It is concluded that emphasizing the importance of organizational culture and its various components is crucial for delivering exceptional customer service. Creating optimal conditions for human capital fosters a sense of unity, resulting in more engaged collaborators who consistently strive to offer the best to customers and service users. Conclusions and limitations: Ultimately, the intrinsic connection between a robust organizational culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Education has wide-ranging benefits to both the individual and wider society. This article investigates the consequences of terrorist incidents on whether households can further their children's schooling. Using both the Global Terrorism Database and Pakistan's Social and Living Standards Measurement, we find that persistent exposure to terrorism significantly reduces the likelihood that parents will continue their children's education. The result suggests, that for every million people, an increase in terrorist incidents causes 26,501 fewer children to continue their education at the primary school education level. We also examine the results by various demographic segments and types of terrorism attacks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the relationships between remittance and financial development (financial institutions and markets) in India and China on the availability of annual data from 1984 to 2018. Human capital formation is considered as a channel of remittances in financial development functions. Institutional quality, Economic globalization, foreign direct investment, economic growth, and government investment are included as a set of control variables in the financial development function. The results of the ARDL bounds test model indicate that remittance can positively impact financial development dynamics in both countries. While considering the human capital formation, higher levels of skilled human capital (secondary and tertiary enrolments) enhance financial development, but low-level human capital (primary enrolments) fails to do so. One contradiction found from the result is that remittance is negatively but significantly affecting financial institutions in India, and also detrimental to China's financial market. Oppositely, remittance positively impacts India's financial market and China's financial institutions. We find the varying impacts of control variables on financial development. The outcome of this paper stresses the necessity of a higher level of skilled human capital and improved institutional quality in both countries, which provides better utilization of remittances and other foreign and domestic financial flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Введение. Анализируется опыт образовательных практик ведущих негосударственных университетов в формировании человеческого капитала. На примере таких стран, как Великобритания, Германия, Китай, Индия, Сингапур и США, представлен компаративный анализ и ключевые характеристики образовательных практик ведущих мировых негосударственных вузов для формирования человеческого капитала. Цель – анализ образовательных практик зарубежных негосударственных вузов в формировании человеческого капитала. Материал и методы. Материалом исследования послужили англоязычные источники, а также официальные сайты ведущих мировых частных университетов: Массачусетский университет, Станфордский университет, университет Пенсильвании (США), Бременский университет Якобса и университет Цеппелин (Германия), Национальный университет Сингапура (NUS) и др. В исследовании использовался компаративный анализ образовательных практик ведущих частных университетов, позволивший раскрыть и обосновать ключевые характеристики образовательных практик в формировании человеческого капитала. Результаты и обсуждение. В качестве основных характеристик образовательных практик ведущих мировых университетов как инструмента реализации человеческого капитала выделяются следующие: – автономия негосударственного вуза, характеризующаяся собственным независимым проектированием стратегии и политики управления университетом и образовательным процессом; – междисциплинарный синтез знаний, базирующийся на интеграции различных научных исследований и широкого применения современных образовательных технологий. Создание междисциплинарных институтов и мультиуниверситетских программ; – высокая концентрация талантов всех субъектов образовательного процесса, где основным фактором формирования человеческого капитала в негосударственном вузе является привилегия селективного отбора студентов с высокими академическими показателями, привлечение известных ученых к исследованиям; – сетевое взаимодействие вузов с производственной сферой в свете подготовки кадров. Основная форма сетевого взаимодействия – создание корпоративных университетов; – консорциум университетов, представляющий собой единый университет, формирующий унифицированный бренд с централизованной структурой; – эффективная система фандрайзинга, обеспечивающая эффективное формирование человеческого капитала. Основным источником являются доходы от собственных научно-практических разработок, проводимые на договорной основе государственных и частных фирм; – репутация исследований. Опережающие научно-практические разработки, характеризующиеся продуктивностью. Научно-исследовательские разработки зависят напрямую от автономии вузов: чем больше автономия университета, тем свободнее он в выборе направлений научных исследований. Заключение. Современная система образования выступает в качестве интегратора интересов индивида и социума, предопределяя развитие человечества на долгие годы. Опыт зарубежной частной высшей школы показывает, что образовательные практики являются действенным механизмом в формировании человеческого капитала. Приобретенный в процессе обучения человеческий капитал изменяет качество жизни человека, оказывает непосредственное влияние на его интеллектуальный, творческий и культурный уровень.

This paper studies the impact of international labor migration on human capital investment in both hosting and sending countries using an integrated theoretical framework. We develop a two-country dynamic stochastic general equilibrium human capital investment model with international labor mobility, in which both decisions to migrate and to invest in skill acquisition are endogenous. We show that the human capital formation process in the countries of origin is very sensitive to migration policies implemented by hosting countries. Our findings show that human capital accumulation in the sending country is encouraged by the possibility of emigration to higher labor productivity countries, supporting the recent view of the 'brain gain' hypothesis. Productivity shocks hitting the hosting country reduce the human capital investment by natives but increase the human capital investment in the sending country when migration is allowed. Finally, we find that migration increases world human capital, increasing the stock of human capital in both hosting and sending countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study efforts to analyze the impact of human capital formation (HCF) on income disparity in developing nations. The panel dataset of 24 countries from the time period of 2003 to 2018 and panel ARDL is used to estimate the results. The outcomes shows that the variables inflation rate, government final consumption expenditures and exports of goods and services are positively while human capital index is negatively persuading the income disparity in developing nations. To rise HCF, government is to define options to expand education and research as well as to emphasize higher education. In doing that so, low income personnel can enjoy better life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Obesity, as a health and social problem with rising prevalence and soaring economic cost, is increasingly drawing scholarly and public policy attention. While many studies have suggested that infant breastfeeding protects against childhood obesity, empirical evidence on this causal relationship is fragile. Using the health capital development theory, this study exploited multiple data sources from the U.S. and a three-way error components model (ECM) with a jackknife resampling plan to estimate the effect of in-hospital breastfeeding initiation and breastfeeding for durations of 3, 6, and 12 months on the prevalence of obesity during teenage years. The main finding was that a 1% rise in the in-hospital breastfeeding initiation rate reduces the teenage obesity prevalence rate by 1.7% (9.6% of a standard deviation). The magnitude of this effect declines as the infant breastfeeding duration lengthens—e.g., the 12-month infant breastfeeding duration rate is associated with a 0.53% (3.7% of a standard deviation) reduction in obesity prevalence in the teenage years (9th to 12th grades). The study findings agree with both the behavioral and physiological theories on the long-term effects of breastfeeding, and have timely implications for public policies promoting infant breastfeeding to reduce the economic burden of teenage and later adult-stage obesity prevalence rates.

A small but increasing body of literature finds that parents invest in their children unequally. However, the evidence is contradictory, and providing convincing causal evidence of the effect of child ability on parental investment in a low-income context is challenging. This paper examines how parents respond to the differing abilities of primary school-aged Ethiopian siblings, using rainfall shocks during the critical developmental period between pregnancy and the first 3 years of a child's life to isolate exogenous variations in child ability within the household, observed at a later stage than birth. The results show that on average parents attempt to compensate disadvantaged children through increased cognitive investment. The effect is significant, but small in magnitude: parents provide about 3.9% of a standard deviation more in educational fees to the lower-ability child in the observed pair. We provide suggestive evidence that families with educated mothers, smaller household size and higher wealth compensate with greater cognitive resources for a lower-ability child. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This paper investigates how the exposure to violent conflicts in utero and in early and late childhood affect human capital formation. I focus on a wide range of child development outcomes, including novel cognitive and non-cognitive indicators. Using monthly and municipality-level variation in the timing and severity of massacres in Colombia from 1999 to 2007, I show that children exposed to terrorist attacks in utero and in childhood achieve lower height-for-age (0.09 SD) and cognitive outcomes (PPVT falls by 0.18SD and math reasoning and general knowledge fall by 0.16SD), and that these results are robust to controlling for mother fixed-effects. The timing of these exposures matters and differs by type of skill. In terms of parental investments, I find some evidence that parents reinforce the negative effects of violence by increasing their frequency of physical aggression.

Evidence is presented in support of the "brain gain" view that the likelihood of migrating to a destination wherein the returns to human capital (schooling) are high creates incentives to acquire human capital in migrant-sending areas. In Mexico, even though internal migrants are more educated than those who stay behind, the average level of schooling in the migrant-sending villages increases with internal migration. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that the dynamic investment effects reverse the static, depletion effects of migration on schooling. Households' access to high-skill internal migration networks significantly increases the likelihood that children will attend school beyond the compulsory level. Access to low-skill internal networks has the opposite effect. By contrast with internal migration, migration from rural Mexico to the U.S. does not select positively on schooling, nor does it significantly influence human capital formation, even though remittances from Mexican migrants in the U.S. far outweigh remittances from internal migrants.

This study investigates the importance of the quality of human capital investment and collegiality (i.e., good colleagues) in achieving the type of acclaim in economics captured by receipt of the Yrjö Jahnsson Award, arguably the second-most prestigious award that a European economist can receive as recognition of the importance of his or her research endeavors. We provide an economic model as a foundation for both qualitative and quantitative analyses. Our results indicate that four institutions, namely the Toulouse School of Economics, University College London, University of Oxford and the London School of Economics generally rank highest in supporting a position of acclaim among academic economics faculties in Europe.

The paper considers theoretical and empirical evidence on the impact of standards-based school reform. Our theoretical synthesis distinguishes between sorting and incentive effects of high standards, and spells out the potential tradeoffs and complementarities between enhancing efficiency and equity in student achievement. Differentiated credentials can be helpful in ameliorating tradeoffs, provided that distinct signals are clearly understood, especially between cognitive and non-cognitive skills. The paper reviews trends in state-level school accountability systems, and examines empirical evidence on the impact of increased standards and expectations on student achievement. Finally, the paper reviews some of the practical challenges facing the standards movement.

Copyright of Investigación Económica is the property of Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, Facultad de Economia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

We provide evidence on the importance of specific inputs for child cognitive skills by estimating alternative specifications of the early childhood production function, between birth and kindergarten. We identify a new input measure, parent-child interaction, which is both important for development and amenable to policy intervention because parenting skills can be taught. We find that the application of reading books and singing songs and sensitive and engaging parent-child interactions as early as 9 months of age have an important effect on reading among kindergarten children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of human capital formation on economic growth of Bangladesh. The study uses the current expenditure on health and public expense on education to measure the human capital formation and growth of gross domestic product as an economic growth proxy. The study employs the time-series data for the period 1998-2017 and performs Augmented Dickey Fuller unit root test to determine data stationarity, Johansen cointegration test to examine the long-run relationship among the variables and Granger causality test to explore the direction of causality. The findings reveal that public expenditure on education causes economic growth positively, while current expenditure on health has no impact on economic growth. Similarly, growth in GDP causes expenditure on health to rise, but it has no impact on education spending. Moreover, education spending causes health expenditure to rise as well. Therefore, the policy makers need to focus more on education and find the way out to materialize the outcome of health expenditure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main thrust of universities is to generate knowledge and drive the economy at local, regional, national and international levels. The ability by universities to generate knowledge has made them become the primary tools for promoting the realization of social, political and economic development goals of any nation. The main purpose of this study was to examine the role of universities in enhancing, strengthening domestic institutions and promoting socioeconomic development in the country. The study utilized the qualitative research methodology to collect data from fifty (50) respondents who included business leaders and university graduates in Zimbabwe. The research results indicated that universities play an important role in socioeconomic, technological and political development of any country. The research also found out that universities play an essential role in shaping national development policies which are vital in attracting both national and foreign investment. Universities promote industrial diversification and entrepreneurship, which are vital preconditions for sustained social, economic and political growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the persistent effects of negative shocks in utero and in infancy on low-income children's health and cognitive outcomes and examines whether timing of exposure matters differentially by skill type. Specifically, I exploit the geographic intensity of extreme floods in Ecuador during the 1997-1998 El Niño phenomenon, which provides exogenous variation in exposure at different periods of early development. I show that children exposed to severe floods in utero, especially during the third trimester, are shorter in stature five and seven years later. Also, children affected by the floods in the first trimester of pregnancy score lower on cognitive tests. Additionally, I explore potential mechanisms by studying health at birth and family inputs (income, consumption, and breastfeeding). I find that children exposed to El Niño floods, especially during the third trimester in utero, were more likely to be born with low birth weight. Furthermore, households affected by El Niño suffered a decline in income, total consumption, and food consumption in the aftermath of the shock. Falsification exercises and robustness checks suggest that selection concerns such as selective fertility, mobility, and infant mortality do not drive these results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]