Rurality and well-being during the middle years of life

Popular stereotypes and theorizing by social scientists suggest that rural people are more satisfied with their communities and happier with their life situations than are their nonrural counterparts. This enhanced well-being is believed to result at least partly from the presence of kinship and friendship ties in the local community and the adherence to traditional religious beliefs. Data from a panel study of nearly 1200 middle aged persons from Pennsylvania surveyed in 1971 and 1984 provided indices of community satisfaction and happiness. When income was controlled, country residents expressed slightly higher levels of community satisfaction than did town or urban dwellers in both time periods. Happiness was not related to residence location. Income was a relatively more important predictor of community satisfaction and happiness among urban than among country residents, while number of friends was relatively more important for rural residents. Number of kin living nearby and adherence to traditional religious beliefs were not related to well-being regardless of residence location.     

Impact of Tuition-Free Education Policy on Child Marriage and Early Childbearing: Does Secondary Matter More?

Child marriage and early childbearing severely impact maternal and child health as well as long-term economic outcomes. Given their continued high incidence, analyzing the feasibility of effective national interventions remains crucial. While cross-sectional surveys and a few small-scale randomized experiments suggest delays in marriage and childbearing associated with secondary schooling, the impact of policies that advance secondary school at a national scale is largely unknown. Using a quasi-experimental research design, we examine whether making secondary school tuition-free delayed marriage and childbearing. We use a difference-in-differences strategy that exploits the natural variation in the timing of policy rollout in five sub-Saharan African countries. Using the Demographic and Health Surveys, we estimate the impact of the policy change by comparing changes in outcomes over the study period between girls who were exposed to the policy to those who were not. We find that tuition-free secondary reduced the probability of marriage and childbearing before 15 and 18 years of age. We observed significantly larger effects associated with tuition-free secondary over tuition-free primary for all outcomes. Our findings show it is important to support tuition-free secondary education as a policy instrument to delay marriage and childbirth, especially given current high rates and their long-term health and economic consequences.