80 CHAPTER 4


Column 2 confirms this finding, showing an even greater effect of height on age schooling started. The upward bias suggests that household-specific endowment (which increases the child’s age) is positively correlated with the height-for-age z-score. Column 3 shows the instrumental variables esti- mation result, which implies upward bias owing to the correlation between individual-level endowment and the height-for-age z-score. It is also likely that the difference between columns 2 and 3 might have captured measure- ment errors in the reported age schooling started. The marginal impact of the height-for-age z-score on the age schooling started is even larger in column 3. To eliminate measurement errors, the weight-for-age z-score is used as an instrument in column 4. The parameter estimate is comparable to that in column 2, which suggests that measurement errors are not a large issue here. These results imply that early-childhood malnutrition delays the age at which a child starts school.17


Current age does not influence age schooling started (not shown in the table), which suggests that the decision to start primary schooling did not change between 1998 and 2004.18 Thus there is no systematic change in the behavior of entering school across cohorts during the period.


Grade Completed


Table 4.6 reports the effects of the height-for-age z-score on years of school- ing. As children have not completed schooling, specifications include age dummies which standardize years of schooling. Columns 1 and 2 compare estimates with cluster and household fixed effects. Though a positive sig- nificant effect is found with cluster fixed effects, the effect is negative and insignificant with household fixed effects. In both cases, girls are more likely to advance grades than boys.


To see slope differences, column 3 interacts the height-for-age z-score with an indicator which takes the value of one if the height-for-age z-score is above 2 and zero otherwise. In this case, an improvement in the height-for-age z-score increases years of schooling completed, but the slope turns out to be negative at large values of the z-score (2–6). In column 4, I also include age


17 A preliminary analysis showed some potential nonmonotonicity in the effect of the height-for- age z-score on the age schooling started. First, estimates of height effects on the age schooling started are significantly negative among relatively short children. Marginal gain (earlier age) from increasing height is greater among less well-endowed children. Second, the number of observations in these estimations suggests that the effect is negative and significant in more than 95 percent of the sample. Some outlying observations from exceptionally tall children (con- ditional on age) change the estimates. This also holds in the analysis of grade completion and


repetitions. 18 There was no change in the official starting age.


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