| 20 January, Thursday (1:00pm-2:30pm) Session 2B: Education and Skills |
What Happens to the Learning Outcomes of Children Left Behind when Parents Work Overseas? Evidence from Tonga
Author/s: Daniel Suryadarma, Trang Vu
When parents work overseas, the impact on left-behind children’s learning outcomes could be positive or negative. A negative impact would imply a negative externality, that an economically motivated migration reduces the stock of future human capital in the country. Tonga has a high share of emigrants; 51% of the population in 2019. Around 80% of households receive overseas remittances. We use a nationally representative survey from Tonga in 2019 to estimate the impact of parents working overseas on the education outcomes of their left-behind children. Our 2SLS results show that children whose at least one parent is working overseas score 1.78 standard deviations higher in reading than those who live with both parents in Tonga. We find no evidence of impact on school participation or mathematics skills. The explanation for a positive impact is higher independence in studying.
JEL codes: I25; O15; R23