title: The effects of maternal employment on the health of school-age children.
abstract: The effects of maternal employment on children's health are theoretically ambiguous and challenging to identify. There are trade-offs between income and time, and a mother's decision to work reflects, in part, her children's health and her underlying preferences. I utilize exogenous variation in each child's youngest sibling's eligibility for kindergarten as an instrument. Using the restricted-access National Health Interview Survey (1985-2004), I identify the effects on overnight hospitalizations, asthma episodes, and injuries/poisonings for children ages 7-17. Maternal employment increases the probability of each adverse health event by nearly 200 percent. These effects are robust and do not reflect a non-representative local effect.
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695-8110, USA. melinda_morrill@ncsu.edu
authors.forename: Melinda Sandler
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Morrill
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001249:Asthma / Q000453:epidemiology*; D002648:Child; D036262:Empirical Research; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D017059:Models, Econometric; D009035:Mothers / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011041:Poisoning / Q000453:epidemiology*; D018570:Risk Assessment; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology; D014931:Women, Working / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000453:epidemiology*