Determinants of Households’ Investment on Education in Afghanistan

Abstract

The Afghanistan’s education development has been one of top priorities of government and international organizations in the last two decades. Despite the efforts and huge amount of budgets which were consumed in this sector still the rate of literacy is very low and more than half of adults in Afghanistan cannot read and write. Public investments in education provide the necessary facilities and would grantee equal access to education for all citizens, however, the utilizing these facilities would be based on the household’s investment. This study pursued to investigate the factors which determine the level of educational investment by Afghan households. In general, the findings show that the income level, residential area and the household head’s age, gender, and educational awareness have positive and significant impact household’s investment on education. The Tobit regression analysis for Income and Expenditure & Labor Force Survey data of 2020 estimates that there is a considerable disparity in demand of education between urban, rural and Kuchi (nomadic tribes) areas. In addition, the findings estimate that educated people are more willing to pay for education than illiterate and less educated ones. The lower spending on female children’s education indicates that more awareness programs should be implemented in order to decrease gender inequality in Afghanistan specially education sector. Since, there is a lack of researches and studies about the demand side of education market in Afghanistan and such studies provide the information and evidences which would be beneficial for policy maker and international organization which work for education development in Afghanistan.