These programs-known as conditional cash transfers- have consistently increased child attendance, even when the transfer is modest.
Administrative costs have been lower than those of other social interventions. In addition to positive schooling outcomes, these transfers have lowered the poverty rate, improved the nutritional status of poor households, and have increased the proportion of children receiving vaccinations and other health services. While there is great variance in performance, a dollar spent on such programs on average produces benefits of about $9.
Because the programs increase the intensity of child investment in school as well as child time in school, they help to break the cycle of poverty whereby poor parents underinvest in their children’s schooling and doom their children to poverty.
By increasing child attendance, Orazem argues, we should even see an increase in teacher attendance, which will increase the quality of schooling offered to the poorest children.