Gender Inequalities in Tasks and Instruction Opportunities within Indian Families

This contribution uses the Indian Time Use Survey (ITUS 1999) to document gender inequalities in tasks in India and their impact on an important aspect of inequality of opportunity - the resources invested in the education of children. It examines the school attendance of Indian children and the probability that they receive informal instruction or assistance with learning at home. The analysis documents clear gender inequalities in the allocation of household tasks among girls and boys and their parents, but finds more mixed evidence regarding gender favoritism in human capital investment. As children living in rural areas grow older, school attendance falls off much more rapidly for girls than for boys; but in urban areas, attendance of boys and girls remains essentially similar. The paper estimates a household fixed-effects model of the probability that a child receives informal instruction at home, and finds no evidence of gender-based discrimination.