We use data from two rounds of the Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS) to study the determinants of subjective well-being in China over the period 2005-2010 during which self-reported happiness scores show an increase across all income groups. Ordered probit regression analysis of well-being...

This paper examines the nature and drivers of Vietnam's paradoxical performance in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) – consistently high student achievement despite being the poorest of all participating countries and a centralized education system. We first document...

We re-examine the economic returns to education in the People's Republic of China (PRC) using data from the China General Social Survey 2010. We find that the conventional ordinary least squares estimate of returns to schooling is 7.8%, while the instrumental variable estimate is 20.9%. The...

This paper examines the role of work-life balance practices (WLB) in explaining the paradox of the contented female worker. After establishing that females report higher levels of job satisfaction than men in the UK, we test whether firm characteristics such as WLB and gender segregation boost...

This paper looks at the determinants of secondary school attendance in Bangladesh with a focus on the interaction between community gender norms and relative supply of madrasas (i.e. Islamic schools). We present a theoretical framework where the probability of children's school participation...

COVID-19 school closure has caused a worldwide shift towards technology-aided home schooling. Given widespread poverty in developing countries, this has raised concerns over new forms of learning inequalities. Using nationwide data on primary and secondary school children in slum and rural...

Family and intergenerational relationships are becoming increasingly important as sources of support and care for the elderly population in the rapidly aging Asian societies. However, this has also raised concern over the reinforcement of cultural preferences for sons as a source of old-age...

Using unique survey data on rural secondary school children, this paper evaluates the relative quality of Islamic secondary schools (i.e. madrasahs) in Bangladesh. Students attending registered madrasahs fare worse in maths and English than students attending non-madrasah schools. However,...

Using a nationally representative data set of Indonesian households and villages, we study the determinants of enrolment in Islamic schools (i.e., madrasahs) and private non-religious vis-Ã -vis public non-religious schools. Multinomial logit estimates indicate that madrasahs systematically...

We elicit adolescent girl's attitudes towards intimate partner violence and child marriage using purposefully collected data from rural Bangladesh. Alongside direct survey questions, we conduct list experiments to elicit true preferences for intimate partner violence and marriage before age...