There is considerable emphasis in academic and policy literatures on intergenerational transmissions of poverty and inequality. The perception is that improving schooling attainment and income/consumption for parents in poor households will result in important reductions in poverty and inequality for the next generation of adults. However, the extents of these intergenerational effects on poverty and inequality are empirical questions that have not been examined much if at all, particularly for developing countries.

Both cognitive and non-cognitive skills are rewarded in the labour market. However there is little evidence about how these abilities are formed in the context of developing countries. I study the way in which cognitive and non-cognitive skills are simultaneously acquired in the transition from childhood to adolescence using longitudinal data from four countries: Peru, India, Vietnam and Ethiopia. I estimate a linearized version of the technology of skills formation, linking inputs observed at 7 to 8 years to outputs observed at 11 to 12 and 14 to 15 years.