Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/39990 
Year of Publication: 
2010
Series/Report no.: 
Proceedings of the German Development Economics Conference, Hannover 2010 No. 33
Publisher: 
Verein für Socialpolitik, Ausschuss für Entwicklungsländer, Göttingen
Abstract: 
Losing a parent is a trauma that has consequences for human capital formation. Does it matter at what age this trauma occurs? Using longitudinal data from the Kagera region in Tanzania that span thirteen years from 1991-2004, we find considerable impact heterogeneity across age at bereavement, but less so for the death of opposite-sex parents. In terms of long-term health status as measured by body height, children who lose their same-sex parent before teenage years are hit hardest. Regarding years of formal education attained in young adulthood, boys whose fathers die before adolescence suffer the most. Maternal bereavement does not fit into this pattern as it affects educational attainment of boys and girls in a similar way. The generally strong interaction between age at parental death and sex of the late parent suggests that the preferences of the surviving parent partly protect same-sex children from orphanhood's detrimental effects on human capital accumulation.
Subjects: 
orphans
health
education
timing of parental death
child development
HIV/AIDS
JEL: 
I31
J19
C14
C23
Document Type: 
Conference Paper

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