Selection and Reporting Bias in Household Surveys of Child Labor: Evidence from Tanzania

Kidolezi, Yohanne N.; Holmes, Jessica A.; Nopo, Hugo; Sommers, Paul M.

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Title:	Selection and Reporting Bias in Household Surveys of Child Labor: Evidence from Tanzania
Authors:	Kidolezi, Yohanne N. Holmes, Jessica A. Nopo, Hugo Sommers, Paul M.
Year:	2007
Periodical:	African Development Review
Volume:	19
Issue:	2
Period:	September
Pages:	368-378
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Tanzania
Subjects:	child labour research methods Labor and Employment Miscellaneous (i.e. Demography, Refugees, Sports) Bibliography/Research Urbanization and Migration
External link:	https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8268.2007.00166.x/pdf
Abstract:	Studies of child labour in developing countries have largely relied on data collected through national household surveys. But government-sponsored household surveys are arguably prone to both sample selection bias and reporting bias. In this paper, the authors compare the demographic and labour market characteristics of children working in the street obtained from the 2000 Tanzanian Integrated Labour Force Survey, a government-sponsored household survey, with the results obtained in a 2004 survey of children who work in the street in the city of Mwanza in northern Tanzania. The study in Mwanza finds that 17.2 percent of working street children do not belong to households and further, that these children are significantly different from those who reside in formal households. Thus the comparisons help illumine the potential biases introduced when child labour studies rely on household samples; specifically, the authors show that children in the non-household based survey work longer hours, have lower educational attainment and suffer worse health outcomes than their counterparts in the government-sponsored household survey. This suggests that studies based on national household surveys may significantly underestimate both the extent and the consequences of child labour. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract]

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