Oportunidades is the leading social protection project in Mexico. This initiative started in 1998 under the name Progresa. This project was mainly for families in rural and urban communities, which were under poor conditions. Oportunidades invested in human capital looking to improve children’s education, health and nutrition. Thus, planning to achieve long-term effects. The goal was not only to reduce poverty, but also to provide better future economic conditions to children. By a conditional cash transfer program, the government intended to guarantee children going to school.
It is a common knowledge the importance of education for economic growth. Nelson Mandela once said “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change …show more content…
If the child works instead of going to school, he or she would earn some income. Hence many children would prefer not to go to school. This decision may be explained by certain reasons. The child can be forced to work, the family would need the labor force their children can provide, or students may have some uncertainty for their future expected utility from attending school. Attanasio, Meghir and Santiago (2012) in their paper, aim to understand the mechanisms for the program to have an effect in education choices.The first assumption refers to the fact that an increase of wages would reduce school participation. Through a structural model the authors evaluate the intertemporal utility from a student to go to school or to work. The model not only considers the probability of students failing a year but also the importance of the previous and future years of schooling, for a person to take the decision to drop school or keep attending. Authors propose a way to disentangle the effect of the grant and the effect of receiving a wage. They conclude that the effect of the grant provided by the government is 3 to 4 times larger than the effect of the wages. In fact, a reduction in wages by 44% would only increase the probability of attending school by 2.1%. In other words, households have strict preferences for their children to go to school rather than them having to work. This conclusion verifies Oportunidades assumption. Indeed …show more content…
and Kenneth I. Wolpin (2006) analyses this program from another point of view. The authors evaluate the effect of this project on fertility outcomes. Once again, a structural model is used to straighten out the general equilibrium effects from the Oportunidades program. This paper provides a complete analysis of the policy. The model reached to forecast the effect of the program on school attendance rates of children. Once again, economists provided evidence to support the efficiency of Oportunidades, as a social protection program, which have an effect in the Mexico’s economy through education
It is a common knowledge the importance of education for economic growth. Nelson Mandela once said “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change …show more content…
If the child works instead of going to school, he or she would earn some income. Hence many children would prefer not to go to school. This decision may be explained by certain reasons. The child can be forced to work, the family would need the labor force their children can provide, or students may have some uncertainty for their future expected utility from attending school. Attanasio, Meghir and Santiago (2012) in their paper, aim to understand the mechanisms for the program to have an effect in education choices.The first assumption refers to the fact that an increase of wages would reduce school participation. Through a structural model the authors evaluate the intertemporal utility from a student to go to school or to work. The model not only considers the probability of students failing a year but also the importance of the previous and future years of schooling, for a person to take the decision to drop school or keep attending. Authors propose a way to disentangle the effect of the grant and the effect of receiving a wage. They conclude that the effect of the grant provided by the government is 3 to 4 times larger than the effect of the wages. In fact, a reduction in wages by 44% would only increase the probability of attending school by 2.1%. In other words, households have strict preferences for their children to go to school rather than them having to work. This conclusion verifies Oportunidades assumption. Indeed …show more content…
and Kenneth I. Wolpin (2006) analyses this program from another point of view. The authors evaluate the effect of this project on fertility outcomes. Once again, a structural model is used to straighten out the general equilibrium effects from the Oportunidades program. This paper provides a complete analysis of the policy. The model reached to forecast the effect of the program on school attendance rates of children. Once again, economists provided evidence to support the efficiency of Oportunidades, as a social protection program, which have an effect in the Mexico’s economy through education