COAL SMOKE AND MORTALITY IN AN EARLY INDUSTRIAL ECONOMY

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Beach, Brian; Hanlon, W. Walker
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Los Angeles; William & Mary; National Bureau of Economic Research
• 刊物名称: ECONOMIC JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0013-0133
• DOI: 10.1111/ecoj.12522
• 发表日期: 2018
• 页码: 2652-2675
• 关键词: particulate air-pollution; infant-mortality; life expectancy; UNITED-STATES; HEALTH; water; exposure; QUALITY; disease; cities

摘要

Air pollution was severe in the nineteenth century, yet its health consequences are often overlooked due to a lack of pollution data. We offer a new approach for inferring local coal use levels based on local industrial structure and industry-specific coal use intensity. This allows us to provide the first estimates of the mortality effects of British industrial coal use in 1851-60. Exploiting wind patterns for identification, we find that a one standard deviation increase in coal use raised infant mortality by 6-8% and that industrial coal use explains roughly one-third of the urban mortality penalty observed during this period.