Work and Marriage: Child Labor, Marriage Matches, and Bride Prices in Rural Tanzania

Labor market wages do not typically provide an accurate or representative measure of the economic returns to child labor in rural settings, especially for women. This paper is a first attempt to identify other outcomes that can shed light on the longer-term impact of child labor. In particular, we examine the quality of marriage matches as measured by per capita household wealth and bride prices. Using an instrumental variables strategy, we show that child labor in agricultural activities is significantly associated with better outcomes in terms of family wealth, particularly for physical assets, land, and bride prices. Although preliminary, our results suggest that agricultural work by children is being positively valued on the marriage market, whereas household child labor work is being penalized. * Address correspondence to [email protected]. We are grateful to Marco Manacorda for useful comments. All errors and omissions are our own.