PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Bietenbeck, Jan
AU  - Piopiunik, Marc
AU  - Wiederhold, Simon
TI  - Africa’s Skill Tragedy
AID  - 10.3368/jhr.53.3.0616-8002R1
DP  - 2018 Jul 01
TA  - Journal of Human Resources
PG  - 553--578
VI  - 53
IP  - 3
4099  - http://jhr.uwpress.org/content/53/3/553.short
4100  - http://jhr.uwpress.org/content/53/3/553.full
SO  - J Hum Resour2018 Jul 01; 53
AB  - We study the importance of teacher subject knowledge for student performance in Sub-Saharan Africa using unique international assessment data for sixth-grade students and their teachers. To circumvent bias due to unobserved student heterogeneity, we exploit variation within students across math and reading. Teacher subject knowledge has a modest impact on student performance. Exploiting vast cross-country differences in economic development, we find that teacher knowledge is effective only in more developed African countries. Results are robust to adding teacher fixed effects and accounting for potential sorting based on subject-specific factors.