Effects of Enhanced Legal Aid in Child Welfare : Evidence from a Randomized Trial of Mi Abogado

Children spend years in foster care, and there are concerns that bureaucratic hurdles contribute to unnecessarily long stays. In a novel approach to policy making, the Chilean government randomized the introduction of a program aimed at reducing these delays in order to evaluate its effects on child well-being. Mi Abogado (My Lawyer) provides legal aid and social services to foster children living in institutions. Using administrative data linked across government registries, we find the program reduced the length of stay in foster care with no increase in subsequent placement, resulting in savings that are substantially greater than the cost of the program. The program also led to a reduction in criminal justice involvement and an improvement in school attendance. The results demonstrate that investment in the quality of foster care services can improve child well-being