This paper studies the effects of mothers' long-term pre-conception exposure to local violence on birth outcomes. Using administrative data from Mexico and two different empirical strategies, our results indicate that mothers' long-term exposure to local violence prior to conception has detrimental effects on infant health at birth. The results suggest that loss of women's human capital and deterioration of mental health are potential underlying mechanisms behind the adverse effects, highlighting intergenerational consequences of exposure to local violence. Our findings shed light on the welfare implications of local violence that are not captured in in-utero exposure to violence.
Authors
- Acknowledgements & Disclosure
- We thank Kasey Buckles, Randy Campbell, Songman Kang, Jiyoon Kim, and conference participants at NBER Summer Institute 2024 Children and Families, the University of Tennessee, 2023 APPAM Fall Research Conference and the 2023 Southern Economic Association Annual Meeting for helpful comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. Corresponding author: Chang. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3386/w32806
- Pages
- 65
- Published in
- United States of America
Table of Contents
- Introduction 3
- Related Literature 7
- Data 9
- Empirical Strategy 13
- Two-way Fixed Effects (TWFE) Model 14
- Difference-in-Differences (DID) Model 15
- Results 17
- Effects on Infant Health: TWFE Model 17
- Effects on Infant Health: DID Model 19
- Selection 20
- Mechanism 23
- Robustness 25
- Heterogeneous effects 28
- Conclusion 29
- Appendix 48
