The Education Motive for Migrant Remittances: Theory and Evidence from India

33 Pages Posted: 22 May 2017

See all articles by Matthieu Delpierre

Matthieu Delpierre

Regional Government of Wallonia, Belgium - Institut wallon de l'Evaluation, de la Prospective et de la Statistique (IWEPS)

Arnaud Dupuy

Centre de Recherche en Économie Appliquée (CREA)

Michel Tenikué

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)

Bertrand Verheyden

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the impact of anticipated old age support, provided by children to parents, on intra-family transfers and education. We highlight an education motive for remittances, according to which migrants have an incentive to invest in their siblings' education via transfers to parents, in order to better share the burden of old age support. Our theory shows that in rich families, selfish parents invest optimally in children education, while in poor families, liquidity constraints are binding and education is fostered by migrant remittances. We test these hypotheses on Indian panel data. Identification is based on within variation in household composition. We find that remittances received from migrants significantly increase with the number of school age children in the household. Retrieving the effects of household characteristics shows that more remittances tend to be sent to poorer and older household heads, confirming the old age support hypothesis.

Keywords: migration, remittances, education, old age support

JEL Classification: D13

Suggested Citation

Delpierre, Matthieu and Dupuy, Arnaud and Tenikué, Michel and Verheyden, Bertrand, The Education Motive for Migrant Remittances: Theory and Evidence from India. IZA Discussion Paper No. 10772, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2971388 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2971388

Matthieu Delpierre (Contact Author)

Regional Government of Wallonia, Belgium - Institut wallon de l'Evaluation, de la Prospective et de la Statistique (IWEPS) ( email )

Place de la Wallonie, 1 Bat II
5100 Jambes
Belgium

Arnaud Dupuy

Centre de Recherche en Économie Appliquée (CREA) ( email )

Campus Limpertsberg
162A, avenue de la Faïencerie
Luxembourg, 1511
Luxembourg

Michel Tenikué

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) ( email )

11, Porte des Sciences
Campus Belval – Maison des Sciences Humaines
Esch-sur-Alzette, L-4366
Luxembourg

Bertrand Verheyden

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) ( email )

11, Porte des Sciences
Campus Belval – Maison des Sciences Humaines
Esch-sur-Alzette, L-4366
Luxembourg

HOME PAGE: http://www.liser.lu

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
70
Abstract Views
465
Rank
598,765
PlumX Metrics