Are some neighborhoods bad for your waistline? A test of neighborhood exposure effects on BMI

Susan Ou

Journal of Health Economics, 2019, vol. 63, issue C, 52-63

Abstract: I study the causal impact of neighborhoods on body mass index (BMI). Through exploiting variation in the number of years individuals have lived in their neighborhood, using a data set from California, I examine if there exist causal effects of exposure to neighborhoods with high potential effects on one's BMI. The identifying assumption is that there are no unobserved individual level characteristics correlated with both BMI and moving, after controlling for observables. I find evidence that suggests that neighborhoods do not have a causal impact on BMI.

Keywords: Obesity; BMI; Neighborhood effects (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jhecon:v:63:y:2019:i:c:p:52-63

DOI: 10.1016/j.jhealeco.2018.10.007

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