Why Are Indian Children So Short?
The Role of Birth Order and Son Preference |
Authors: |
Seema Jayachandran and Rohini Pande |
Source: |
American Economic Review, American Economic Review 2017, 107(9): 2600–2629 |
Topic(s): |
Birth interval
|
Country: |
Asia
India
|
Published: |
OCT 2017 |
Abstract: |
Child stunting in India exceeds that in poorer regions like sub-
Saharan Africa. Data on over 168,000 children show that, relative
to Africa, India’s height disadvantage increases sharply with
birth order. We posit that India’s steep birth order gradient is due
to favoritism toward eldest sons, which affects parents’ fertility
decisions and resource allocation across children. We show that,
within India, the gradient is steeper for high-son-preference regions
and religions. The gradient also varies with sibling gender as
predicted. A back-of-the-envelope calculation suggests that India’s
steeper birth order gradient can explain over one-half of the India-
Africa gap in average child height. (JEL I12, J13, O15, Z12, Z13) |
Web: |
http://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/aer.20151282 |
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