Essays on Inequality and Education
| dc.contributor.author | Vahidmanesh, Atiyeh | en |
| dc.contributor.committeechair | Salehi-Isfahani, Djavad | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Ge, Suqin | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | Tsang, Kwok Ping | en |
| dc.contributor.committeemember | You, Wen | en |
| dc.contributor.department | Economics, Science | en |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2018-08-25T06:00:24Z | en |
| dc.date.available | 2018-08-25T06:00:24Z | en |
| dc.date.issued | 2017-03-02 | en |
| dc.description.abstract | This dissertation provides evidence of the return to education in Iran as well as measurement of inequality of opportunity and the Human Opportunity Index using cross-section data of Trends in Mathematics and Science Studies and Harmonized Household Income and Expenditure Surveys of several Middle Eastern Countries. The first chapter studies the return to education and the effect of school availability on education attainment in Iran. The Census 2006 allows us to get closer to the district of schooling by focusing on non-migrants. We estimate the return to education and the effect of school availability both for migrant and non-migrant sub-samples. We employ school availability as an instrument to correct the ability bias. We find availability of school increases women's education attainment more than men's and it is higher among the non-migrant sample. Using instrumental variable, the return to education is 6.50% in 2012 suggesting an upward bias in OLS. The second chapter provides estimates of Human Opportunity Index (HOI) in the Middle East and North Africa. Our estimates show the HOI improve over time in MENA region and compare favorably with similar measures computed for other regions, notably Latin America. Using Shapley decomposition, we find that parental background and place of living are the most important circumstances explaining inequality of opportunity to access in basic opportunities. Understanding the change in HOI and factors that influence it most complement existing analyses of inequality of opportunity in education, earning, and consumption for MENA countries because they focus on aspects of inequality of opportunity that are largely provided by the state. The third chapter provides estimates of inequality of educational opportunity using TIMSS dataset. We estimate the index of IOP using the ex-ante approach both for the fourth and eighth grade. The computed index of IOP shows that there is an improvement in IOP both for mathematics and science from grade four to eight. The investigations about relevant inputs suggest that there is a negative relationship between educational expenditure and the level of IOP. The relationship between the index of IOP and average economic growth as well as GDP per capita is positive. | en |
| dc.description.abstractgeneral | This dissertation provides evidence of the return to education in Iran as well as measurement of inequality of opportunity and the Human Opportunity Index using cross-section data of Trends in Mathematics and Science Studies and Harmonized Household Income and Expenditure Surveys of several Middle Eastern Countries. The first chapter studies the return to education and the effect of school availability on education attainment in Iran. The results show school availability has a positive and significant effect on women education attainment. We also estimate the rates of return to education for men between 25-60 years old in Iran in 2006 and 2012. Our findings show that the returns to schooling decline in Iran between 2006 and 2012. The second chapter provides estimates of Human Opportunity Index (HOI) in the Middle East and North Africa. Our estimates show the HOI improve over time in MENA region and compare favorably with similar measures computed for other regions, notably Latin America. The HOI evaluates the basic opportunities which mostly publicly provided. This makes the HOI relevant for understanding the effectiveness of MENA governments in providing children with an equal chance to succeed. Our findings show the HOI improves over time in MENA. The improvement over time is not surprising because as a service expands, especially if it starts inequitably, it generally covers more of the less advantaged households. The third chapter provides estimates of inequality of educational opportunity (IOP) using TIMSS dataset. We estimate the index of IOP using variance decomposition method. Our estimates show that in most countries of our sample the index of IOP increases from fourth grade to eighth grade suggesting the circumstances out of the control of an individual play important role in higher level of education. We investigate the correlational relationship between the index of IOP and some economic characteristics. Our findings suggest that there is a negative relationship between educational expenditure and the level of IOP. The relationship between the index of IOP and average economic growth as well as GDP per capita is positive. | en |
| dc.description.degree | Ph. D. | en |
| dc.format.medium | ETD | en |
| dc.identifier.other | vt_gsexam:10179 | en |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10919/84914 | en |
| dc.publisher | Virginia Tech | en |
| dc.rights | In Copyright | en |
| dc.rights.uri | http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ | en |
| dc.subject | Inequality of opportunity | en |
| dc.subject | Human Opportunity Index | en |
| dc.subject | Return to Education | en |
| dc.subject | Education Attainment | en |
| dc.title | Essays on Inequality and Education | en |
| dc.type | Dissertation | en |
| thesis.degree.discipline | Economics | en |
| thesis.degree.grantor | Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University | en |
| thesis.degree.level | doctoral | en |
| thesis.degree.name | Ph. D. | en |
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