Few issues in the lives of the world’s poor receive more attention from rich country observers than child labour. Child labour is often perceived as a form of child abuse, and popular opinion in high income countries seems to believe that child labour stems from opportunistic businessmen seeking cheap labour and callous parents happy to live off the earnings of their children. Thus, economic growth and the economic gains from global integration either will not affect child labour or may increase it by expanding the earnings opportunities open to children. Consequently, lowering the demand for child labour in poor countries is a main focus of anti-child labour policies. Moreover, governments in both the U.S. and Europe have committed to employing punitive, income-reducing measures such as trade sanctions to punish countries with high levels of child labour. This labour demand focused policy has been developed in an environment where surprisingly little is known about the determinants of child labour. The aim of this study is to better understand the determinants of child labour through a careful, empirical analysis of household survey data on child labour from three Asian economies: Nepal, Pakistan, and Vietnam.
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