Does migration benefit the schooling of children left behind? Evidence from rural northwest China
Does migration benefit the schooling of children left behind? Evidence from rural northwest China
复制标题
移民对留守儿童的教育有好处吗？
DOI：
10.4054/demres.2013.29.2
复制
发表时间：
2013-07-04
影响因子：
2.1
通讯作者：
Hu, Feng
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Hu, Feng
背景虽然许多研究发现，移民可以通过增加家庭收入，使家乡社区和留守家庭成员受益，从而缓解投资的流动性限制；人们对“内部”迁移和汇款如何影响源地社区留守儿童的教育绩效知之甚少。 目的本文的目的是研究迁移对中国西北地区留守农村儿童教育获得的影响。为了更好地了解成年家庭成员移徙时这些儿童的教育成绩是提高还是受到影响，我试图将汇款的影响与移徙的影响区分开来。方法本研究使用的数据来自2004年甘肃省儿童和家庭调查。为了解释与移民相关的变量可能存在的内生性，我使用移民网络变量来衡量不同的移民策略。结果结果表明，包括父母在内的成年家庭成员的缺席对留守儿童的教育表现产生负面影响，但汇款可以部分补偿这种损失。男孩的教育表现似乎并没有受到成年家庭成员移徙的太大影响。相比之下，成年家庭成员的缺席对女孩的教育表现有很大的负面影响，而汇款对女孩的积极影响也很显着。 结论 拥有大量内部移民流动的其他发展中国家和相关政策制定者可能会对研究结果感兴趣，因为结果表明，外来移民寄回家的汇款可以作为移民原籍地区人力资本投资的渠道，特别是女孩人力资本投资的渠道。
BACKGROUNDWhile many studies have found that migration can benefit home communities and family members left behind by increasing household income, thus easing liquidity constraints on investment; less is known about how "internal" migration and remittances affect the educational performance of the children who are left behind in the source communities.OBJECTIVEMy aim in this paper is to examine the effects of migration on the educational attainment of left-behind rural children in northwest China. To gain a better understanding of whether the educational performance of these children improves or suffers when adult family members migrate, I attempt to disentangle the effects of remittances from the effects of migration. METHODS The data used in this study come from the 2004 wave of the Gansu Survey of Children and Families. To account for the possible endogeneity of migration-related variables, I use the migration network variables to instrument for different migration strategies.RESULTSThe results show that the absence of adult household members, including parents, has a negative effect on the educational performance of the children left behind, but that remittances can partially compensate for this loss. Boys' educational performance does not seem to be greatly affected by the migration of adult household members. By contrast, the absence of adult household members is shown to have a large negative effect on girls' educational performance, and the positive effect of remittances is also found to be significant for girls.CONCLUSIONSThe findings may be of interest to other developing countries with large internal migration flows and to the relevant policy makers, as the results suggest that remittances sent home by out-migrants may serve as a channel for investing in human capital in the migrants' regions of origin, and especially for investing in the human capital of girls.