Wheels of Fortune

And, what do you know, the solution turns out to be strikingly simple: give the girls bikes. A new CESifo paper by Nathan Fiala, Ana García-Hernández, Kritika Narula and Nishith Prakash guides us through this heart-warming natural experiment in Zambia.

They picked Zambia because it has one of the world’s highest levels of gender inequality, placed 116 out of 145 in the corresponding World Economic Forum ranking. Then, they selected 100 schools in the rural part of the country, where 98% of the girls in their sample walk to school. In order to have a controlled randomized experiment, they divided the schools into three groups: 20 “payment” ones, where the parents had to pay US$ 5 upfront for the bike, 25 “non-payment” ones, where the bikes were provided for free, with the remaining 55 schools as a control group where no bikes were provided.

The hypothesis was that their girl test subjects—all 2,471 of them, with just one refusing the bike—would benefit from faster and safer access to school, as well as from improvements in female empowerment and education outcomes.

While long distance to school is a problem for everyone, it is especially challenging for girls reaching puberty, who face a greater risk of being assaulted on the way to or from school. In fact, 35% of the girls in the study reported being sexually harassed during their commute. This safety concern not only has immediate effects on the girls’ physical and psychological well-being, but also has an impact on long-term decisions such as employment choices.

The rationale for charging a small upfront sum for the bike was twofold: paying for the bike can induce parents to push their girls to use the bike more, while also signaling the parents’ willingness to invest in their daughters’ education.

The researchers found that the bikes decreased commuting time by 35 minutes one way, equivalent to a 34% reduction from the baseline. It also lowered the probability of girls being teased or whistled at by 22%, and the probability of missing school or leaving early for home out of safety concerns by 39%.

They also found that punctuality improved by 1.45 days per week, with late arrivals fully 66% lower than in the control group. Even more interestingly, the intervention reduced absenteeism by 29%, which translates into an additional 5 school days per academic year, an effect that persisted for several years afterwards. There was also a 37% reduction in dropouts one year later, 21% after two years, and 17% after three. Furthermore, math test scores improved and promotion to the next grade rose by 19% in the later years.

Finally, this improvement in education led to higher empowerment among the girls, in particular among those who received bicycles with a small cost to their families, in the form of feeling more in control of their choices, expressing higher aspirations, having a better self-image and harboring a desire to delay marriage and pregnancy.

The girls recognized and appreciated the change brought about by their bikes, for which they expressed touching affection. As one of them put it, “I used to clean it whenever another person touched it... When you ride a clean bicycle you even feel like a queen.”

Humble bikes: A simple solution, remarkable benefits. .