Biology As Destiny? Short And Long-Run Determinants Of Intergenerational Transmission Of Birth Weight

Janet Currie and Enrico Moreti ()
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Enrico Moretti

Working Papers from eSocialSciences

Abstract: Little is known about the mechanisms underlying the transfer of economic status between generations. This paper addresses the question of whether inter-generational correlations in health contribute to the perpetuation of economic status. We examine inter-generational correlations in birth weight, a key indicator of the health of newborns that we link to future educational attainment and earnings using a unique data set based on California births from 1960s to the present. We use names and birth dates to link the records of mothers and children. We also identify mothers who are siblings. We show that there is a strong intergenerational correlation in the birth weight of mothers and children, but that a measure of household income at the time of the mother's birth is also predictive of low birth weight and that there is an interaction between maternal low birth weight and poverty in the production of low birth weight. Together these findings suggest that intergenerational correlations in health could play a role in the intergenerational transmission of income. Parent's income affects child health, and health at birth affects future income.

Keywords: birth weight; intergenerational correlations; income; mother's income; California (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005-09
Note: Institutional Papers
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.esocialsciences.org/Download/repecDownl ... s&AId=194&fref=repec

Related works:
Working Paper: Biology as Destiny? Short and Long-Run Determinants of Intergenerational Transmission of Birth Weight (2005)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ess:wpaper:id:194

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from eSocialSciences
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Padma Prakash ().