Impact of International Migration and Remittances on Child Schooling and Child Work: The Case of Egypt

Asmaa Elbadawy, Population Council
Ragui Assaad, University of Minnesota

We examine the impact of international migration and remittances on children’s schooling and work in Egypt. Egypt is among the largest ten remittance-receiving countries in the world (Wahba 2007). As has been noted in the literature, the effect of migration and remittances on schooling is a priori ambiguous. The main estimation issue we face is the possible endogeneity of migration. We use the national-level Egypt Labor Market Panel Survey of 2006 (ELMPS 06). The main estimation problem to overcome is the endogeneity of migration. Since migration opportunities tend to be network-dependent, one possible instrument is the intensity of migration on the village level based on the Egyptian Census. Remittances have a substantial effect on school attendance for university-aged boys. As for child work, the remittance income effect is dominant for market work especially for young boys and the substitution effect is dominant for older boys especially for short-duration domestic work.