Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
产前现金转移暴露的健康效应
The Health Effects of In Utero Exposure To Cash Transfers
摘要
We study the effects of in utero exposure to a large cash transfer program on the health of children. Using data from South Africa, we use the age-eligibility threshold of the Older Person’s Grant and the variation in age differences between children and a coresident elderly to show that in utero exposure to the cash transfer led to a 0.26 SD increase in height-for-age of children. Among older children, we leverage the variation in the timing of the start of benefits to show important out-sized benefits of in utero exposure compared to starting later in early life. These results are robust to a variety of different checks including controlling for endogenous household formation. Given the importance of early child health in determining long-term outcomes, our results suggest that extending child-specific cash transfer programs to pregnant mothers can have long-term positive impacts.
中文摘要
我们研究了子宫内暴露于大规模现金转移项目对儿童健康的影响。利用南非的数据，我们依据老年人补助金的年龄资格门槛及儿童与同住老年人年龄差异的变化，证明子宫内暴露于现金转移使儿童身高别年龄指数提高了0.26个标准差。在年龄较大的儿童中，我们利用福利开始时间的差异，展示了与生命早期较晚阶段开始相比，子宫内暴露带来的显著超额益处。这些结果在多种检验下依然稳健，包括控制内生性家庭构成。鉴于早期儿童健康对长期结果的决定性作用，我们的研究结果表明，将针对儿童的现金转移项目扩展至孕妇，可产生长期的积极影响。