Child Care Subsidies and Childhood Obesity

Chris M. Herbst () and Erdal Tekin
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Chris M. Herbst: Arizona State University

No 4255, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: Child care subsidies play a critical role in facilitating the transition of disadvantaged mothers from welfare to work. However, little is known about the influence of these policies on children's health and well-being. In this paper, we study the impact of subsidy receipt on low-income children's weight outcomes in the fall and spring of kindergarten. The goals of our empirical analysis are twofold. We first utilize standard OLS and fixed effects methods to explore body mass index as well as measures of overweight and obesity. We then turn to quantile regression to address the possibility that subsidy receipt has heterogeneous effects on children's weight at different points in the BMI distribution. Results suggest that subsidy receipt is associated with increases in BMI and a greater likelihood of being overweight and obese. We also find substantial variation in subsidy effects across the BMI distribution. In particular, child care subsidies have no effect on BMI at the lower end of the distribution, inconsistent effects in the middle of the distribution, and large effects at the top of the distribution. Our results point to the use of non-parental child care, particularly center-based services, as the key mechanism through which subsidies influence children's weight outcomes.

Keywords: obesity; subsidy; child care (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I12 I18 J13 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 42 pages
Date: 2009-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Published - published in: Review of Economics of the Household, 2011, 9 (3), 349 - 378

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Related works:
Journal Article: Child care subsidies and childhood obesity (2011)
Working Paper: Child Care Subsidies and Childhood Obesity (2009)
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