2005/01/01 by Eric V. Edmonds · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Nursing · #Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare #Child Nutrition and Water Access #International Development and Aid #Economics #Panel data #Per capita #Poverty #Demographic economics #Per capita income #Labour economics #Economic growth #Demography #Econometrics #Population
paper · pdf · doi:10.3368/jhr.xl.1.77
openalex publication_date 2005/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
From 1993 to 1997, GDP per capita in Vietnam grew by between 6 and 7 percent annually. Child labor declined by 28 percent over this period. Using a simple, nonparametric decomposition, I investigate the relationship between improvements in per capita expenditure and child labor with a panel dataset of Vietnamese households that spans this episode of growth. I find that improvements in per capita expenditure can explain 80 percent of the decline in child labor that occurs in households whose expenditures improve enough to move out of poverty. This finding suggests a previously undocumented role for economic growth in the amelioration of child labor.