Page 112 |
Save page Remove page | Previous | 112 of 171 | Next |
|
small (250x250 max)
medium (500x500 max)
Large (1000x1000 max)
Extra Large
large ( > 500x500)
Full Resolution
All (PDF)
|
This page
All
|
103
socioeconomic controls include mother-specific characteristics aggregated to the county-level,
including education, ethnicity, income, prenatal care, and age. They chose this
period in the hope that much of the remaining variation in pollution after controlling for
these variables comes from the differential impacts of the 1980 recession on pollution
levels. Therefore, changes in pollution are transitory and less likely to affect location
choice. One caveat to this identification strategy is that one must ignore the fact that the
recession will also directly affect location decisions as adults move from hard-hit labor
markets to more prosperous labor markets, i.e. there may still be selection at work.
They weaken their identifying assumptions in two ways. First they treat current
pollution as endogenous, instrumenting for the change in pollution with lagged pollution
levels; the latter will be a valid instrumental variable (IV) if there is no autocorrelation in
pollution. Second, they find all counties with low levels of manufacturing employment in
1980, and then look at neighboring counties with and without high levels of
manufacturing employment. If a neighboring county experiences a substantial decrease in
manufacturing employment, it is likely to experience a reduction in Total Suspended
Particles (TSPs). Because of wind and other weather components, a reduction in TSPs in
a neighboring county should affect a county’s own pollution levels. The authors then
compare the effect of changes in pollution on changes in infant mortality in counties that
had neighbors with a large reduction in employment to those in counties with neighbors
who did not experience a large reduction in employment. Thus their new identifying
assumption is that demand shocks in a neighboring county will not have spillover effects
and induce migration from the county under consideration.
103
Object Description
| Title | Essays on health and well-being |
| Author | Zweig, Jacqueline Smith |
| Author email | smith2@usc.edu; jackiesmith04@yahoo.com |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Economics |
| School | College of Letters, Arts and Sciences |
| Date defended/completed | 2011-03-23 |
| Date submitted | 2011 |
| Restricted until | Restricted until 26 Apr. 2012. |
| Date published | 2012-04-26 |
| Advisor (committee chair) |
Easterlin, Richard A. Ham, John C. |
| Advisor (committee member) | Melguizo, Tatiana |
| Abstract | This dissertation is comprised of three chapters that use microeconometric techniques to investigate the factors that affect people’s well-being. In the first two chapters, well-being is defined as life satisfaction or health satisfaction. The first chapter explores how the movement from socialism to capitalism affected the life satisfaction and health satisfaction of East Germans relative to West Germans after reunification. The second chapter examines whether women are happier, less happy, or equally happy as men in countries at various stages of development. The third chapter examines whether pollution affects the academic performance of school children; their academic performance and achievements will have important implications for their future well-being. |
| Keyword | happiness; well-being |
| Geographic subject | Germany |
| Geographic subject (state) | California |
| Geographic subject (country) | USA |
| Coverage date | 1990/2010; 2002/2008 |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m3782 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Rights | Zweig, Jacqueline Smith |
| Repository name | Libraries, University of Southern California |
| Repository address | Los Angeles, California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Filename | etd-Zweig-4500 |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume23/etd-Zweig-4500.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 112 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Full text | 103 socioeconomic controls include mother-specific characteristics aggregated to the county-level, including education, ethnicity, income, prenatal care, and age. They chose this period in the hope that much of the remaining variation in pollution after controlling for these variables comes from the differential impacts of the 1980 recession on pollution levels. Therefore, changes in pollution are transitory and less likely to affect location choice. One caveat to this identification strategy is that one must ignore the fact that the recession will also directly affect location decisions as adults move from hard-hit labor markets to more prosperous labor markets, i.e. there may still be selection at work. They weaken their identifying assumptions in two ways. First they treat current pollution as endogenous, instrumenting for the change in pollution with lagged pollution levels; the latter will be a valid instrumental variable (IV) if there is no autocorrelation in pollution. Second, they find all counties with low levels of manufacturing employment in 1980, and then look at neighboring counties with and without high levels of manufacturing employment. If a neighboring county experiences a substantial decrease in manufacturing employment, it is likely to experience a reduction in Total Suspended Particles (TSPs). Because of wind and other weather components, a reduction in TSPs in a neighboring county should affect a county’s own pollution levels. The authors then compare the effect of changes in pollution on changes in infant mortality in counties that had neighbors with a large reduction in employment to those in counties with neighbors who did not experience a large reduction in employment. Thus their new identifying assumption is that demand shocks in a neighboring county will not have spillover effects and induce migration from the county under consideration. 103 |
