The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia
The economic impact of war may be visible in the long run and particularly through its impact on human capital. This paper uses unique district level data on landmine contamination intensity in Cambodia combined with survey data on individuals to evaluate the long-run impact of Cambodia's 30 ye...
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| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | EN |
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2012
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10986/4768 |
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okr-10986-47682021-04-23T14:02:19Z The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia Merrouche, Ouarda International Conflicts Negotiations Sanctions F510 Human Capital Skills Occupational Choice Labor Productivity J240 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions: Consumer Economics Health Education and Training: Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty P360 The economic impact of war may be visible in the long run and particularly through its impact on human capital. This paper uses unique district level data on landmine contamination intensity in Cambodia combined with survey data on individuals to evaluate the long-run impact of Cambodia's 30 years of war (1970-1998) on education levels and earnings. These effects are identified using difference-in-differences (DD) and instrumental variables (IV) estimators. In the DD framework I exploit two sources of variation in an individual's exposure to the conflict: age in 1970 and landmine contamination intensity in the district of residence. The IV specification uses the distance to the Thai border as an exogenous source of variation in landmine contamination intensity. The most conservative result indicates that individuals who were too young to have attended school before the start of the war received on average 0.5 less years of education. And, immediately after the war there was no visible effect on earnings. The effects are therefore overall weak. I argue that the destruction of physical capital may be what contributes to drive down the returns to education in Cambodia post-war. The estimates reported may be very conservative due to both error in our measure of conflict intensity and possible selection bias in the placement of prosperous regions. 2012-03-30T07:29:39Z 2012-03-30T07:29:39Z 2011 Journal Article Journal of Development Studies 00220388 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/4768 EN http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo World Bank Journal Article Cambodia |
| repository_type |
Digital Repository |
| institution_category |
Foreign Institution |
| institution |
Digital Repositories |
| building |
World Bank Open Knowledge Repository |
| collection |
World Bank |
| language |
EN |
| topic |
International Conflicts Negotiations Sanctions F510 Human Capital Skills Occupational Choice Labor Productivity J240 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions: Consumer Economics Health Education and Training: Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty P360 |
| spellingShingle |
International Conflicts Negotiations Sanctions F510 Human Capital Skills Occupational Choice Labor Productivity J240 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions: Consumer Economics Health Education and Training: Welfare, Income, Wealth, and Poverty P360 Merrouche, Ouarda The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| geographic_facet |
Cambodia |
| relation |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo |
| description |
The economic impact of war may be visible in the long run and particularly through its impact on human capital. This paper uses unique district level data on landmine contamination intensity in Cambodia combined with survey data on individuals to evaluate the long-run impact of Cambodia's 30 years of war (1970-1998) on education levels and earnings. These effects are identified using difference-in-differences (DD) and instrumental variables (IV) estimators. In the DD framework I exploit two sources of variation in an individual's exposure to the conflict: age in 1970 and landmine contamination intensity in the district of residence. The IV specification uses the distance to the Thai border as an exogenous source of variation in landmine contamination intensity. The most conservative result indicates that individuals who were too young to have attended school before the start of the war received on average 0.5 less years of education. And, immediately after the war there was no visible effect on earnings. The effects are therefore overall weak. I argue that the destruction of physical capital may be what contributes to drive down the returns to education in Cambodia post-war. The estimates reported may be very conservative due to both error in our measure of conflict intensity and possible selection bias in the placement of prosperous regions. |
| format |
Journal Article |
| author |
Merrouche, Ouarda |
| author_facet |
Merrouche, Ouarda |
| author_sort |
Merrouche, Ouarda |
| title |
The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| title_short |
The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| title_full |
The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| title_fullStr |
The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| title_full_unstemmed |
The Long Term Educational Cost of War: Evidence from Landmine Contamination in Cambodia |
| title_sort |
long term educational cost of war: evidence from landmine contamination in cambodia |
| publishDate |
2012 |
| url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/4768 |
| _version_ |
1764392685133627392 |