IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/aea/aejapp/v12y2020i1p348-76.html

Educational Investment Responses to Economic Opportunity: Evidence from Indian Road Construction

Author

Listed:
  • Anjali Adukia
  • Sam Asher
  • Paul Novosad

Abstract

The rural poor in developing countries, once economically isolated, are increasingly being connected to outside markets. Whether these new connections crowd out or encourage educational investment is a central question. We examine the effects on educational choices of 115,000 new roads built under India's flagship road construction program. We find that children stay in school longer and perform better on standardized exams. Heterogeneity in treatment effects supports a standard human capital investment model: enrollment increases most when nearby labor markets offer high returns to educationand least when they imply high opportunity costs of schooling.

Suggested Citation

  • Anjali Adukia & Sam Asher & Paul Novosad, 2020. "Educational Investment Responses to Economic Opportunity: Evidence from Indian Road Construction," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(1), pages 348-376, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aejapp:v:12:y:2020:i:1:p:348-76
    DOI: 10.1257/app.20180036
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/app.20180036
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/app.20180036.data
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/app.20180036.appx
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/app.20180036.ds
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1257/app.20180036?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I25 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Economic Development
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • O18 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
    • R42 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Transportation Economics - - - Government and Private Investment Analysis; Road Maintenance; Transportation Planning

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:aea:aejapp:v:12:y:2020:i:1:p:348-76. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael P. Albert (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aeaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.