In recent years, there has been an astonishing proliferation of empirical work on child labor. An Econlit search of keywords "child lab*r" reveals a total of 6 peer reviewed journal articles between 1980 and 1990, 65 between 1990 and 2000, and 143 in the first five years of the present decade....

We explore the relationship between greater exposure to trade (as measured by openness) and child labor in a cross country setting. Our methodology accounts for the fact that trade flows are endogenous to child labor (and labor standards more generally) by examining the relationship between...

This paper examines the relationship between child labor and access to credit at a cross-country level. Even though this link is theoretically central to child labor, so far there has been little work done to assess its importance empirically. We measure child labor as a country aggregate, and...

This paper reviews the theoretical arguments for and against linking international labor standards to trade. Based on theory alone it is difficult to generalize about the effect of labor standards on efficiency and equity. Some economists have argued that international labor standards are merely...

We study the impact of child labor standards in Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) on a variety of child labor market outcomes, including employment, education, and household inequality. We develop a stylized general equilibrium model of child labor in an economy open to international trade and...

Many developing countries use employment guarantee programs to combat poverty. This paper examines the consequences of such employment guarantee programs for the human capital accumulation of children. It exploits the phased roll-out of India's flagship Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment...

Many policy instruments can be used to address or affect child labor, even if they are implemented to achieve other objectives. From a theoretical point of view, however, the impact of these policies on child labor is undetermined. This paper discusses the evidence generated by rigorous...

This is the first study to investigate the short- and long-term causal effects of a child-labor ban. The study explores the law that increased the minimum employment age from 14 to 16 in Brazil in 1998, and uncovers its impact on time allocated to schooling and work in the short term and on...

This paper investigates the causal impact of the change in Brazil?s child labor law of December 1998. The change increased the minimum legal age of entry into the labor force from 14 to 16 years. The analysis uses a difference-in-differences approach to estimate the impact of this change in the...

This paper uses a unique micro panel dataset of Brazilian students to investigate the impact of working while in school on learning outcomes. The potential endogeneity is addressed through the use of difference-in-difference and instrumental variable estimators. A negative effect of working on...