The Causal Impact of Removing Children from Abusive and Neglectful Homes

Anthony Bald (), Eric Chyn, Justine Hastings and Margarita Machelett
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Anthony Bald: Brown University

No 2019-001, Working Papers from Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group

Abstract: This paper uses administrative data to measure causal impacts of removing children from families investigated for abuse or neglect. We use the removal tendency of quasi-experimentally assigned child protective service investigators as an instrument for whether authorities removed and placed children into foster care. Our main analysis estimates impacts on educational outcomes by gender and age at the time of an investigation. We find that removal significantly increases standardized test scores for young girls. There are no detectable impacts on the test scores of girls removed at older ages or boys of any age. For older children, we also find few significant impacts of removal on the likelihood of having a juvenile conviction, graduating from high school, enrolling in a postsecondary institution, or having a teenage birth. We investigate potential mechanisms driving heterogeneous impacts by gender and age. Our results do not appear to be driven by heterogeneous effects on foster care placement, school mobility and quality, or participation in special education programs. For girls, we find that removal significantly increases the likelihood of post-investigation criminal charges or incarceration for parents and caretakers who are the perpetrators of abuse or neglect.

Keywords: child abuse and neglect; human capital (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H75 I21 I24 I28 I38 J12 J13 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem and nep-ure
Note: MIP
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (23)

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http://humcap.uchicago.edu/RePEc/hka/wpaper/Bald_C ... emoving-children.pdf First version, January 2019 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The Causal Impact of Removing Children from Abusive and Neglectful Homes (2022)
Working Paper: The causal impact of removing children from abusive and neglectful homes (2021)
Working Paper: The Causal Impact of Removing Children from Abusive and Neglectful Homes (2019)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hka:wpaper:2019-001

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