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Female education is a factor that has a significant effect on human development. Human development is an academic discipline concerned with the social and economic progress in impoverished regions. In particular, researchers seek to determine what factors explain differences in rates of development. Female education is one of the major explanatory variables behind the rates of social and economic development, and has been shown to have a positive correlation with both. Socially, female education increases womens' status in society and reduces certain social ills. Given that female enrollment rates are lower than those of males in nearly every region, increased female education is also seen as a good in itself and is one of the U.N. Millennium Developmental Goals. Economically, female education helps bring more women into the work force and boosts a country's economic output. According to notable economist Lawrence Summers, “investment in the education of girls may well be the highest-return investment available in the developing world.”

Measurement
There are multiple ways researchers measure the effects of female education on development. Typically, studies concern themselves with the gender gap between the education levels of boys and girls and not simply the level of female education. This helps to distinguish the specific effects of female education from the benefits of education in general. Note that some studies, particularly older ones, do simply look at females' total education levels. One way to measure education levels is to look at what percentage of each gender graduates from each stage of school. A similar, more exact way is to look at the average number of years of schooling a member of each gender receives. A third approach uses the literacy rates for each gender, as literacy is one of the earliest and primary aims of education. It thus provides an idea of not just how much education was received but how effective it was.

The most common way to measure economic development is to look at changes in growth of GDP. In order to ensure that a connection holds, correlations are analyzed across different countries over different periods of time. Typically the result given is a relatively steady average effect, although variation over time can also be measured. The benefits of education to an individual can also be analyzed. This is done by first finding the cost of education and the amount of income that would have been earned during years enrolled in school. Subtracting these two quantities from the total increase in income due to education gives the net return.

Economic benefits
Investing in an individual's education results in a net monetary gain over the course of their lifetime. According to Harry Patrinos, lead education economist at the World Bank, “the profitability of education, according to estimates of private rate of return, is indisputable, universal, and global.” The principle holds particularly for females, who can expect a 1.2% higher return than males on the resources they invest in education. Providing one extra year of education to girls increases their wages by 10-20%. This increase is 5% more than the corresponding returns on giving a boy an extra year of schooling.

This individual monetary gain turns into an increase in the overall economic gains of a country. Girls are underrepresented in schooling, meaning that investments aimed specifically at educating women should produce bigger dividends. Although investment in female education is not universal, David Dollar and Roberta Gatti present findings that show this decision is not “an efficient economic choice for developing countries” and that "countries that under-invest grow more slowly.” Looking holistically at the opportunity cost lost by not investing in girls, the total missed GDP growth is between 1.2% and 1.5%. When looking at different regions, it is estimated that 0.4-0.9% of the difference in GDP growth is accounted for solely by differences in the gender gap in education. The effect of the educational gender gap is more pronounced when a country is only moderately poor. Thus the incentive to invest in women goes up as a country moves out of extreme poverty.

In addition to total economic growth, female education also increases the equitability of the distribution of wealth in a society. Increased female education is important for achieving this as it targets the impoverished females, a particularly disadvantaged group. There is also evidence in developed countries that lower gender disparity in educational attainment for a country correlates with overall lower income disparity within society.

Social benefits
Female education also leads to significant social development. Some of the most notable of these benefits include decreased fertility rates and lower infant and maternal mortality rates. Closing the gender gap in education also increases gender equality, which is considered a good in itself as it ensures equal rights and opportunities for people regardless of gender. Female education has cognitive benefits for women as well. This increases the quality of life for women and also leads to other benefits. Examples of this are that women who are educated are better able to make decisions related to health, both for themselves and their children. Cognitive abilities also translate to increased political participation among women. Educated women are more likely to engage in civic participation and attend political meetings, and in several instances in the developing world have successfully organized movements to secure benefits for themselves. Evidence even points to an increased likelihood of democratic governance in countries with well-educated women.

There are also benefits relating to the woman’s role in the household. Educated women have been found to experience less domestic violence, regardless of employment status. Women with an education are also more involved in the decision-making process of the family and report making more decisions over a given time period. In particular, these benefits extend to economic decisions. Besides the intrinsic value of increasing a women's agency, having women play a more active role in the family also brings about social benefits for family members. In a household where the mother is educated, children and especially girls are more likely to attend school. In households where a mother is not educated, adult literacy programs can indirectly help teach mothers the value of education and encourage them to send their children to school. There are also a number of other benefits for children associated with having an educated mother over an educated father, including higher survival rates and better nutrition.

Ineffectiveness
There are some cases in which female education has less of an effect on development. Economically, the benefits of investing in women are much smaller in areas facing high levels of poverty. Also, in some cases the education females receive is of much lower quality than what males receive, lowering its effectiveness. This phenomenon can be accompanied by the so-called hidden curriculum in schools, where certain values are reinforced. Emphasis on the superiority of boys can cause educated women to pass up economic opportunities in favor of lower paying traditionally female jobs, with poor economic and social consequences. There are also situations in which female education helps development on the macro-scale but is inefficient for a family. In societies where women are married off and leave the family while men stay back and take care of their parents, investing in sons is more valuable to parents. Additionally, while investing in female education has a higher overall return when looking at all levels of education, through primary school investing in males has a higher rate of return. This leaves families only planning to send their children to primary school with incentives to invest in their sons' education over their daughters' education. Socially, societal gender roles may stifle the ability of female education to improve gender equality for women. This is particularly the case when education for women is only seen as a tool for making women more attractive wives.

Some researchers don't claim that female education necessarily has little effect on development, but instead question the methodologies of the research showing that it does have a sizeable effect. One issue that researchers acknowledge is the difficulty in comparing education levels. The same number of years of schooling in two different countries may have very different educational content. Similarly, what is termed ‘primary school’ in different country may vary widely. Also, while extensive information for education in developed countries exists, data is only available for a small number of developing countries. This brings into question to what extent the results can be generalized for all developing countries. Additionally, while the pure economic benefits are relatively uncontroversial, there is some discrepancy over how to measure the social benefits, with some variability between studies.