| Educating girls quite possibly gets a higher rate of reward than any other investment (投资) available in the developing world. Women's education may be an unusual field for economists (经济学家), but increasing women's contribution to development is actually as much an economic as a social issue. And economics, with its focus on encouragement, provides all explanation for why so many girls fail to receive an education. Parents in low-income countries don't invest willingly in their daughters because they do not expect them to make an economic contribution to the family: girls grow up only to marry into somebody else's family and bear children. Girls are thus seen as less valuable than boys and usually have to stay at home to do housework while their brothers are sent to school. An educated mother, on the other hand, has greater earning abilities outside the home and faces an entirely different set of choices. She is likely to have fewer but healthier children and can insist on developing all her children, ensuring that her daughters are given a fair chance. The education of her daughters then makes it much more likely that the next generation of girls, as well as of boys, will be educated and healthy. Few will argue that educating women has great social benefits. But it has huge economic advantages as well. Most obviously, there is the direct effect of education on the wages of female workers. Wages rise by 10 to 20 percent for each additional year of schooling. Such big returns are impressive by the standard of other available investments, but they are just the beginning. Educating women also has a significant influence on health practices, including family planning.
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