How much international variation in child height can sanitation explain?

Dean Spears

No 1438, Working Papers from Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Center for Health and Wellbeing.

Abstract: Physical height is an important economic variable reflecting health and human capital. Puzzlingly, however, differences in average height across developing countries are not well explained by differences in wealth. In particular, children in India are shorter, on average, than children in Africa who are poorer, on average, a paradox called "the Asian enigma" which has received much attention from economists. This paper provides the first documentation of a quantitatively important gradient between child height and sanitation that can statistically explain a large fraction of international height differences. This association between sanitation and human capital is robustly stable, even after accounting for other heterogeneity, such as in GDP. I apply three complementary empirical strategies to identify the association between sanitation and child height: country-level regressions across 140 country-years in 65 developing countries; within-country analysis of differences over time within Indian districts; and econometric decomposition of the India-Africa height difference in child-level data. Open defecation, which is exceptionally widespread in India, can account for much or all of the excess stunting in India.

Keywords: India; children; growth rate; height; sewage; wealth (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 I10 I39 Q53 R29 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-12
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (14)

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Related works:
Working Paper: How much international variation in child height can sanitation explain ? (2013)
Working Paper: How much international variation in child height can sanitation explain? (2012)
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