Children's welfare exposure and subsequent development

• 成果类型: Article; Proceedings Paper
• 署名作者: Levine, PB; Zimmerman, DJ
• 署名单位: Wellesley College; National Bureau of Economic Research; Williams College
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2003.06.004
• 发表日期: 2005
• 页码: 31-56
• 关键词: mother; CHILDREN; welfare exposure; developmental outcome

摘要

We examine the extent to which children are exposed to the welfare system through their mother's receipt of benefits and its impact on several developmental outcomes. Using data from the matched mother-child file from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), we find that children's welfare exposure is substantial. By age 10, over one-third of all children will have lived in a welfare household; black, non-Hispanic children face a much higher rate of exposure. Simple correlations suggest a strong negative relationship between maternal welfare receipt and children's outcomes. In this paper, we implement three alternative strategies (instrumental variables, sibling differences, and child fixed effects models) designed to identify whether this correlation can be attributed to the mother's welfare receipt directly or to other characteristics of mothers who receive welfare, regardless of whether or not those characteristics are observable to the researcher. Based on the results of all three estimation strategies, we find little evidence of any causal link between maternal welfare receipt and children's developmental outcomes. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.