This webinar offers a comprehensive account of the intergenerational transmission of education across religious groups in Africa, home to some of the world’s largest Christian and Muslim communities. First, we use census data from 20 countries to construct new upward and downward religion-specific intergenerational mobility (IM) statistics. Christian boys and girls have much higher upward and lower downward mobility than Muslims and Animists. Muslims perform well only in a handful of countries where they are small minorities. Second, we trace the roots of these disparities. Although family structures differ across faiths, this variation explains only a small fraction of the observed IM inequities (roughly 12%). Inter-religious differences in occupational specialization and urban residence do not play any role.
In contrast, regional features explain nearly half of the imbalances in educational mobility. Third, we isolate the causal impact of regions from spatial sorting exploiting information on children whose households moved when they were at different ages during childhood. Irrespective of the religious identity, regional exposure effects are present for all children moving before 12. Fourth, we map and characterize the religious IM gaps across thousands of African regions. Among numerous regional geographic, economic, and historical features, the district’s Muslim share is the most important correlate. Children adhering to Islam underperform Christians in areas with substantial Muslim communities. Fifth, survey data reveal that Muslims display stronger in-group preferences and place a lower valuation on education. Our findings call for more research on the origins of religious segregation and the role of religion-specific, institutional, and social conventions on education and opportunity.
About the author: Elias Papaioannou is the academic director of the Wheeler Institute for Business and Development and economics professor at London Business School, focusing on international finance, political economy, applied econometrics, growth, and development. In the academic year 2019/2020, Elias held the Varian Visiting Professor of Economics at the MIT Department of Economics. After completing his doctorate in 2005, he worked for two years at the Financial Research Division of the European Central Bank (ECB) in Frankfurt, Germany. From 2007 to 2012, he served as an economics assistant at Dartmouth College in the US. Between 2010 and 2012, he was a visiting assistant professor at the economics department of Harvard University in the US. His research has been recognized with a consolidator ERC grant in 2018, the inaugural 2013 European Investment Bank Young Economist Award, the 2005 European Economic Association’s Young Economist Award, and the Royal Economic Association’s Austin Robinson Memorial Prize, 2008. He is a research affiliate of the Centre for Economic Policy Research.
Elias’ research has been published in leading peer-refereed journals, with his work appearing in numerous book volumes. He regularly consults with international organizations and institutional investors on macroeconomic developments in the EU and Greece. In 2005, Elias received his Ph.D. from LBS. He holds a Master’s in Public Policy and Administration from Columbia University and an LL.B. Bachelor’s in Law from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.
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