Objective Better measurement of the health and cognitive benefits of breastfeeding by using sibling comparisons to reduce sample selection bias. Data We use data on the breastfeeding history, physical and emotional health, academic performance, cognitive ability, and demographic characteristics...

Although the effect of parents on their children has been the focus of much research on health and families, the influence of children on their parents has not been well studied. In this paper, I examine the effect of the sex composition of children on mothers' physical condition, as proxied by...

This thesis comes out at a time when the debate on between-state and social group demographic and health inequalities continues to be largely debated based on most recent available information. However, analyses based on the recent demographic and health data have serious limitations in terms of...

Low-income children are less likely to receive recommended health services than their high-income counterparts. This paper examines whether the design of parental Medicaid benefit packages could serve as a mechanism for reducing income-based disparities in unmet health care needs, considering...

Recent economic literature has advanced the notion that cognitive biases and behavioural barriers may be important influencers of uptake decisions in respect of public programs that are designed to help disadvantaged people. This paper provides the first evidence on the determinants of uptake of...

Using traditional health capital model of Grossman (1972) and Wagstaff (1986a) this paper attempts to fill in the theoretical missing link between mothers’ autonomy and household consumption behavior, particularly focusing on the consumption of child health inputs. It has been shown in this...

This study proposed, first, to carry out, based on archive documents, an incursion as regards matrimonial relationships of XVIIIth century with all legal, economic and social connotations involved. The marriage contracts studied fall into a typology more closely of what was happening in the same...

We study the consequences of broader access to credit and to capital markets on household's decisions over the number of children. In a life-cycle model of choice with forward and backward caring between parents and children, we analyze the effects of relaxing adults' borrowing constrains and...

In this paper, we examine the old-age security hypothesis according to which parents rear children because they expect the latter to care for them in their later years. In developing countries where there are no perfect capital markets, children are usually viewed as a potential source of income...