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Title: Essays on the Economic History of the family

Citation Type: Dissertation/Thesis

Publication Year: 2011

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Abstract: This thesis studies the economic effects of child labor and compulsory schooling laws (CLLs and CSLs). In the first two chapters I study the consequences of the enactment of CSLs on education and fertility. I use a combination of a difference-in-difference (DID) methodology with an identification strategy based on legislative borders to find that the laws increased enrollment by 7% and educational attainment by about 0.3 years of education over the long run. As for fertility, I find that CSLs imply a contemporaneous reduction in fertility of about 15%. In the long run, women that received compulsory education were expected to have approximately 0.15 to 0.3 fewer children. In the third chapter of this dissertation I look at the effect of CLLs on industrial performance. I find that industries that initially relied extensively on child labor suffered a significant reduction in growth as a consequence of the social legislation. I conjecture that the potentially sizable but narrowly concentrated effects of CLLs could explain why child labor is still common in the developing world today.

Url: https://repositori.upf.edu/handle/10230/12372

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Authors: Puerta, Juan Manuel

Institution: Universitat Pompeu Fabra

Department: Departament d'Economia i Empresa

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Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Family and Marriage

Countries: United States