Marriage as a Mechanism: Women’s Education and Wealth in Malawi

Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Penn collection
PSC Working Paper Series
Degree type
Discipline
Subject
Developing countries
Divorce
Education
Gender
Household wealth
Malawi
Malawi Longitudinal Survey of Family Life
Marriage
Socioeconomic status
Stability
United States
Women
Demography, Population, and Ecology
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Sociology
Funder
Grant number
License
Copyright date
Distributor
Related resources
Contributor
Abstract

Research has found that in the United States women have greater economic returns to a college degree than men, because of more stable marriages and other family income. Using cross-sectional data of women aged 19-40 years in Malawi from the Malawi Longitudinal Study of Families and Health (n = 898), we test whether higher education is associated with these same benefits in a context with lower educational attainment levels, fewer job opportunities, and different marriage patterns. We find that better educated women are more likely to have better educated spouses and higher household wealth. Though divorce is negatively associated with wealth, we do not find an association between education and divorce. This analysis provides motivation for further research on the how education is associated with outcomes for women in developing countries.

Advisor
Date Range for Data Collection (Start Date)
Date Range for Data Collection (End Date)
Digital Object Identifier
Series name and number
Publication date
2012-09-01
Volume number
Issue number
Publisher
Publisher DOI
Journal Issue
Comments
Spell, Sarah, Philip Anglewicz, and Hans-Peter Kohler. 2012. "Marriage as a Mechanism: Women’s Education and Wealth in Malawi." PSC Working Paper Series, PSC 12-09.
Recommended citation
Collection