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The Economics Of Child Labor, Xinye Zheng

Economics Dissertations

In this dissertation, we first develop a simple two-period model to examine the parent's optimal choice of children's time. We identify factors such as wage rate, school fees, education returns, degree of children's altruism toward their parents and the parents' discounting rate that influence the parents' optimal choice, and discuss their impacts on the optimal choice. Children's time is an important resource for rural households in developing economies, and it is typically allocated by the parents. Two basic uses for this resource are: working in the labor market and attending schools. Schooling today may make children more productive in the …