The effect of labor migration and remittances on children's education among blacks in South Africa

Receipt of remittances improves school enrolment in South Africa

By: Lu, Y and Treiman, DJ
Published by: California Center for Population Research, 2007
Via: Eldis

In South Africa, black people are much more likely to migrate for work and to send remittances home than any other group. This paper studies the effect of those remittances on black children’s schooling, using data from household and labour force surveys.

The analysis finds that children in households where both parents are present are much more likely to be enrolled than children with either one or both parents absent. However, in those households where a parent is absent due to migration for work, the receipt of remittances substantially increases the likelihood that children are in school, through three pathways:

• increased household educational spending
• reduced child labour
• mitigation of the negative effect of parental absence due to out-migration.

Children in households without remittances are disadvantaged compared to recipient households, and in some respect are even worse-off than their counterparts in non-migrant households, primarily due to the deleterious effect of parental out-migration with no economic compensation.

The paper also assesses the social consequences of remittances. It finds that remittances help reduce intra-familial gender inequalities as well as inter-familial socioeconomic inequalities in schooling: remittances lead to an increase in the likelihood of enrollment for males, rural children, children from poor households, and children whose parents are absent, thus essentially eliminating the effects of these household characteristics. However, the positive effect of the household educational environment continues to be strong, suggesting the central importance of human capital and cultural capital.

(http://www.ccpr.ucla.edu/ccprwpseries/ccpr_001_07.pdf)