Household Schooling Decisions in Rural Pakistan. Working Paper.

A study of household schooling decisions in rural Pakistan found serious supply-side constraints on female primary education in the villages studied. Field surveys of 25 Pakistani villages were integrated with economic theory and econometric analysis to investigate the sequential nature of educational decisions. The full-information maximum likelihood estimation of the sequential schooling decision model uncovers important dynamics of the gender gap in education, transitory income and wealth effects, and intrahousehold resource allocation patterns. The findings show that although school-entry rates were low in rural Pakistan (64 percent for boys and 24 percent for girls), the educational retention rate was high, and schooling progression rates became comparable between male and female students at higher levels of education. Moreover, a household's human and physical assets and income changes affected children's educational patterns significantly. These findings are consistent with theoretical implications of optimal schooling behavior under binding credit constraints. Finally, serious supply-side constraints on female primary education suggest the importance of supply-side policy interventions to Pakistan's rural primary education. Hiring more female teachers and providing more primary schools for girls closer to villages would improve the chances of rural Pakistani girls entering school and staying enrolled. Appendices summarize the field survey and present seven data tables. (Contains 63 references.) (SV)