Universal Early-Life Health Policies in the Nordic Countries

Miriam Wüst

Journal of Economic Perspectives, 2022, vol. 36, issue 2, 175-98

Abstract: Given mounting evidence on the negative impact of early-life shocks for the wellbeing of people over the life course, a growing economics literature studies whether early-life policies have symmetric positive effects. This paper zooms in on research on this topic from the Nordic countries, where all families have access to a comprehensive set of early-life health programs, including prenatal, maternity, and well-infant care. I describe this Nordic model of universal early-life health policies and discuss the existing evidence on its causal effects from two categories of studies. First, studying the introduction of universal policies, research has documented important short- and long-run benefits for the health, education, and labor market trajectories of treated cohorts. Second, exploiting modern-day changes to policy design, research for now documents short- and medium-run impacts of universal care on primarily maternal and child health as well as parental investment behaviors. I conclude with directions for future research.

JEL-codes: H51 I12 I18 J13 J16 J18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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DOI: 10.1257/jep.36.2.175

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