Educational access and poverty reduction: The case of Ghana 1991–2006

Ghana has seen notable poverty reduction alongside improvements in school participation since 1991. This paper examines the role of education in determining welfare and poverty and its reciprocal, the role of welfare and other aspects of economic privilege in the determination of school attendance and progression. Two groups of models are presented using data from the Ghana Living Standard Surveys. The results suggest that education levels play an important role in determining household welfare and that higher levels of education have relatively larger and increasing benefits. Improvements are observed in relation to lower levels of educational access over the period, while the lucrative benefits of progression beyond the compulsory phase are found largely to be the preserve of relatively economically privileged households.

Research highlights
► Absolute poverty has decreased in Ghana since 1991.
► Education is linked with important welfare benefits.
► Increasing returns by level of education suggest widening inequality.
► Access to education has increased at lower levels since 1991.
► Access to the highest returns to education remained limited to the better-off in 2006.