THE ROLE OF EDUCATION IN EXPLAINING THE RURAL URBAN WEALTH GAP IN PAKISTAN

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the role of education in influencing the wealth disparity between rural and urban regions across four provinces of Pakistan. Utilizing data from the 2017-18 Demographic Health Survey (DHS) of Pakistan, the research employs an Ordinal Logistic regression model to analyze the findings. It assesses the correlation between educational and socioeconomic characteristics variations and the Wealth Index, which is categorized for this analysis. The findings of this research highlight the significance of higher education in enhancing the wealth index (WI) and bridging the wealth gap between rural and urban areas. However, the results also indicate that higher education is not the sole determinant contributing to improvements in the WI score compared to other educational levels. The findings further emphasized that the influence of education level on the well-being index of rural households is more significant than that of urban households. In light of these results, this study offers specific policy recommendations aimed at maximizing the advantages of enhanced education across the nation.