Father Absence and the Reverse Gender Gap in Latin American Education

Recent work on gender differences in academic performance in wealthy countries highlights the importance of family structure: Boys' education suffers more than girls' education does when biological fathers are absent. We explored whether high rates of father absence in Latin America and the Caribbean might help explain why girls in the region have been more likely than boys to complete secondary school for decades. Data from the Demographic and Health Surveys instead demonstrated that the effect of father absence did not differ between boys and girls. The reverse gender gap in Latin American education cannot be explained by father absence compromising boys' on-time progression at ages 9 to 14 more than girls'. In the United States and other high-income countries, boys are particularly disadvantaged by father absence in poorer households, but in Latin America and the Caribbean poorer households may have higher levels of promale bias that offset any similar pattern.