Nber Working Paper Series Non-Cognitive Deficits and Young Adult Outcomes: The Long-Run Impacts of a Universal Child Care Program (original) (raw)
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The Long-Run Impacts of a Universal Child Care Program
American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 2019
Past research documents the persistence of positive impacts of early life interventions on noncognitive skills. We test the symmetry of this finding by studying the persistence of a sizeable negative shock to noncognitive outcomes arising with the introduction of universal child care in Quebec. We find that the negative effects on noncognitive outcomes persisted to school ages, and also that cohorts with increased child care access had worse health, lower life satisfaction, and higher crime rates later in life. Our results reinforce previous evidence of the central role of the early childhood environment for long-run success. (JEL I12, I31, J13, K42)
New Evidence on the Impacts of Access to and Attending Universal Child-Care in Canada
Canadian Public Policy, 2013
In Canada, advocates of universal child care often point to policies implemented in Quebec as providing a model for early education and care policies in other provinces. While these policies have proven to be incredibly popular among citizens, initial evaluations of access to these programs indicated they led to a multitude of undesirable child developmental, health and family outcomes. These research findings ignited substantial controversy and criticism. In this study, we show the robustness of the initial analyses to i) concerns over whether negative outcomes would vanish over time as suppliers gained experience providing child care, ii) concerns regarding multiple testing, and iii) concerns that the original test measured the causal impact of childcare availability and not child care attendance. A notable exception is that despite estimated effects stemming from the policy indicating declines in motor-social development scores in Quebec relative to the rest of Canada, our analyses imply that on average attending childcare in Canada leads to a significant increase in this test score. However, our analysis reveals substantial heterogeneity in program impacts that occur in response to the Quebec policies and indicates that most of the negative impacts reported in earlier research are driven by children from families who only attended childcare in response to the implementation of this policy.
Do the Perils of Universal Childcare Depend on the Child's Age?
CESifo Economic Studies, 2014
The rising participation of women in paid work has not only heightened demand for universal early education and care programs but also led to increased use of child care amongst children at earlier ages. Prior research investigating Quebec's universal highlysubsidized child care documented significant declines in a variety of developmental outcomes for all children aged 0-4 years. However, past analysis has not explored whether these effects vary for children of different ages. In this paper, we demonstrate substantial heterogeneity in policy impacts by child age. Children who gain access to subsidized child care at earlier ages experience significantly larger negative impacts on developmental scores, health and behavioral outcomes. The sole exception is the negative relationship between access to subsidized child care and hyperactivity scores which steepens with child age. Our analysis additionally provides significant evidence of treatment effect heterogeneity within ages, and reveals benefits from access to universal child care on developmental scores for those that are above three years of age. * We would like to thank Jonas Vlachos as well as participants at the CESIFO Economic Studies and UCLS Conference on Children, Families and Human Capital Formation and seminar presentations at York University and the University of Ottawa for many helpful comments and suggestions that improved this draft. This paper is a revised version of a portion of Kottelenberg's Queen's University 2009 Master's research paper. Lehrer wishes to thank SSHRC for research support. We are responsible for all errors.
Early Childcare and Child Non-Cognitive Outcomes
2017
In this study, we analyze the impact of attendance of formal early childcare on a number of non- cognitive child outcomes, conditional on several socio-demographic characteristics of the household and the child. While several studies have explored the determinants of cognitive outcomes, in our analysis we focus on non-cognitive skills that were found to be important determinants of cognitive skills and of later life outcomes. Using a newly available data-set for Northern Italy on child care and child outcomes1, we consider the impact of attendance of formal childcare on non-cognitive outcomes, such as attitudes to schooling and social behavior, identified among children born in 2006 at the end of the first year of primary school. Using innovative empirical strategies to deal with endogeneity and imperfect measurement of non-cognitive outcomes, we show that attending an infant toddler center significantly improves school readiness and social interactions a few years later. Coherently...
Child Development and Cognitive Outcomes: The Role of Public and Family Inputs
Ringrazio i miei genitori su cui ho potuto contare in ogni momento di questo lungo viaggio. Mi hanno accompagnato in ogni città in cui sono stata, da Milano a Roma a Torino fino a New York! Edè grazie a loro che mi sono potuta sentire sempre a casa. Un pensiero speciale va a mia sorella, che porto sempre con me, e che ringrazio anche per il suo supporto tecnologico! "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." "What is essential is invisible to the eye," the little prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember. "It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important." "It is the time I have wasted for my rose-" said the little prince, so that he would be sure to remember. "Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose..." "I am responsible for my rose," the little prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember. Antoine-Marie-Roger de Saint-Exupèry, The Little Prince, Chapter XXI. Dedico questa tesi a Marco per essermi stato vicino in questi anni e per avermi insegnato cosa significhi compiere insieme ogni passo. Grazie per aver scelto di curare con me la nostra rosa. Contents List of Tables iii List of Figures v Co-authorship disclaimer vii Preface Chapter 1. Public and parental investments on children. Evidence from the literature on non-parental child care 1.1. Introduction 1.2. Theoretical background 1.3. Empirical issues for the estimation of child care impacts 1.4. Review of selected studies evaluating child care impacts 1.5. Conclusions Appendix 1.A. Functional form assumptions and substitutability patterns Chapter 2. Exploring the impacts of public child care on mothers and children in Italy: does rationing play a role? 2.1. Introduction 2.2. The Literature 2.3. Child care in Italy 2.4. Theoretical Framework 2.5. Empirical strategy 2.6. Data and Variables 2.7. Results 2.8. Robustness checks 2.9. Non-linearity in child care impacts 2.10. Conclusions Appendix 2.A. Institutional and historical background: the child care policy in Italy Appendix 2.B. The INVALSI data Appendix 2.C. Analysis on missing values Chapter 3. Mother or market care? A structural estimation of child care impacts on child development 3.1. Introduction 3.2. Background 3.3. The model 3.4. Econometric strategy i 3.5. Data 3.6. Results 3.7. Counterfactual exercises 3.8. Concluding remarks Appendix 3.A. Analytic solution of the model Appendix 3.B. Empirical analysis and estimation Appendix 3.C. PSID-CDS dataList of Tables 1.1. Early childhood cognitive outcomes. Description. 1.2. Early childhood cognitive outcomes. Results. 1.3. Early childhood noncognitive outcomes. Description. List of Figures 1.1. Formal child care enrollment in selected countries, 2008. 1.2. Non-parental child care inputs for child's development. 2.1. Child care coverage across Italian regions, 2005. 2.2. Correlation between mother's working status and child care coverage. 2.3. Correlation between Language and Math scores and child care coverage. 2.4. Non-linear relationship between child care coverage and the outcomes. 2.A.1. Slots in formal child care across Italian regions, 2010. 2.A.2. Slots in additional services across Italian regions, 2010. 3.1. Non-parental child care time by mother's employment status. 3.2. Maternal child care time and leisure by mother's employment status. 3.3. LW raw score by child's age. 3.4. Mother's choices by child's age. 3.5. Preference parameters for leisure. 3.6. Preference parameters for consumption. 3.7. Preference parameters for child's ability. 3.8. Maternal time and non-parental child care productivity. 3.9. Income and previous period child's ability productivity. 3.10. Goodness of fit for child's test score measure by child's age. 3.11. Productivity parameters with leisure-minimizing preferences. 3.E.1. Productivity parameters setting T = 12. 3.E.2. Productivity parameters if maternal time is only active time with the mother. 3.E.3. Productivity parameters if maternal time includes also time with the father around. 3.E.4. Productivity parameters allowing income to affect wages. 3.E.5. Productivity parameters with a different specification for child's initial endowment. v 5 6 CHAPTER 1 Public and parental investments on children. Evidence from the literature on non-parental child care ABSTRACT-This chapter summarizes the most recent empirical research on parental and social investments in children, with a focus on policies providing non-parental child care. The empirical findings are conceptualized in a simple theoretical framework showing how parents' decisions and policy intervention interact in contributing to child's development. The results from these studies are presented taking into account the institutional context where the policy has been implemented and the timing of the intervention. The majority of large-scale policies providing non-parental child care have positive effects on children's cognitive outcomes, both in the short and in the medium run. Early childhood policies can have long-lasting effects on adult outcomes, also boosting the development of noncognitive skills, that are used and rewarded in labor market and social life.
Can’t Buy Mommy’s Love? Universal Childcare and Children’s Long-Term Cognitive Development
What happens to children’s long-run cognitive development when introducing universal high-quality childcare for 3-year-olds mainly crowds out family care? To answer this question, we take advantage of a sizeable expansion of publicly subsidized full-time high-quality childcare for 3-year-olds in Spain in the early 1990s. Identification relies on variation in the initial speed of the expansion of childcare slots across states. Using a difference-in-difference approach, we find strong evidence for sizable improvements in children’s reading skills at age 15 (0.15 standard deviation) and weak evidence for a reduction in grade retentions during primary school (2.5 percentage points). The effects are driven by girls and disadvantaged children.
American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, 2011
We exploit changes in child benefits in Canada to study the impact of family income on child and family well-being. Using variation in child benefits across province, time, and family type, we study outcomes spanning test scores, mental health, physical health, and deprivation measures. The findings suggest that child benefit programs had significant positive effects on test scores, maternal health, and mental health, among other measures. We find strong and interesting differences in the effects of benefits by child sex: benefits have stronger effects on educational outcomes and physical health for boys, and on mental health outcomes for girls. (JEL I12, I31, I38, J13)