The Long Run Educational Impact of Iran-Iraq War

Children exposed to wars and other catastrophic events could suffer long lasting effects if their human capital accumulation is disrupted. In this paper, I use Iran Population Census 2006 to estimate the long run educational attainment impact of Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988). By comparing cohorts exposed to war at various points in life in war provinces to other cohorts, I find the probability of finishing high school is reduced by 8.8 percentage points for early life exposure to war. The impact of later life war exposure, i.e. during primary school, is smaller and becomes insignificant in some cases.