Industrialization and pollution: The long-term Impact of early-life exposure on human capital formation

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Chen, Pan
• 署名单位: University of Colorado System; University of Colorado Boulder
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2024.105270
• 发表日期: 2025
• 关键词: Industrialization; Air pollution; CHINA; human capital

摘要

Air quality in developing countries is often much worse than in developed economies, yet evidence on the long-term human capital effects of air pollution in these settings is limited. This paper uses a cohort difference- in-differences approach to examine the impact of early-life exposure to air pollution during China's 1950s industrialization on human capital formation. It assumes that economic opportunities linked to industrial plants impact upwind and downwind counties similarly within a 30-mile radius. The results indicate that moving from the 25th to 75th percentile of exposure reduces children's education by approximately 0.11 years. This effect size is notably larger than the impacts of three other factors affecting educational attainment in both China and the United States.