The transmission of health across 7 generations in China, 1789-1906

Jean-François Maystadt and Giuseppe Migali

No 587013, Working Papers of LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance from KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance

Abstract: We study the intergenerational transmission of health using linked registered data from China between 1789 and 1906. We first document the intergenerational correlations across 7 generations. We then identify intergenerational causal associations comparing children born from twin mothers or fathers. In particular, wefind a strong and per- sistent intergenerational elasticity between mothers and children of about 0.52. The intergenerational association from fathers is much weaker and seems to be largely driven by genetic factors. The estimates remain relatively stable up to generation 5 and are robust to different checks. Overall, our results highlight the nurturing role of women in explaining the intergenerational transmission of health, stressing the key role played by women in affecting children's health outcomes in developing countries.

Keywords: intergenerational correlations; causal effects; long-term health outcomes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Economics Working Paper Series 2017/001 , pages 1-42

Downloads: (external link)
https://lirias.kuleuven.be/retrieve/460145 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The transmission of health across 7 generations in China, 1789–1906 (2021)
Working Paper: The transmission of health across 7 generations in China, 1789-1906 (2017)
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:ete:licosp:587013

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers of LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance from KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance
Bibliographic data for series maintained by library EBIB ().