Private vs. Public Schooling in Pakistan: Test Scores, Costs, and Civic Values

Featuring
Jishnu Das
World Bank

With Discussant
Samuel Berlinski
Inter-American Development Bank

More than 20 percent of primary students in countries such as India and Pakistan attend private schools, which tend to be small, low-cost enterprises that effectively face no regulatory oversight and receive no government subsidies. How do they compare to their public counterparts?

Jishnu Das presents the results of a study assessing the quality of private primary education versus public in Pakistan. His results show that test scores in private schools are 0.8 to 1 standard deviation higher than in public schools and that, surprisingly, children in private schools have better civic skills, exhibit lower gender bias, and are better informed about Pakistan and more “pro-democratic.” With private schools 40 percent less expensive per student than public schools, Das’s results argue for reassessing education delivery in low-income settings, where governance and accountability problems in public schools are common.

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