TY - JOUR
T1 - Family disadvantage and the gender gap in behavioral and educational outcomes
AU - Autor, David
AU - Figlio, David
AU - Karbownik, Krzysztof
AU - Roth, Jeffrey
AU - Wasserman, Melanie
N1 - Funding Information:
*Autor: Department of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 50 Memorial Drive, E52-438, Cambridge, MA 02142, and National Bureau of Economic Research (email: dautor@mit.edu); Figlio: School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University, 2120 Campus Drive, Evanston IL 60208, and National Bureau of Economic Research (email: figlio@northwestern.edu); Karbownik: Department of Economics, Emory University, 1602 Fishburne Drive, Atlanta, GA 30322, and National Bureau of Economic Research (email: krzysztof.karbownik@emory.edu); Roth: University of Florida, 1701 SW 16th Avenue, Gainesville, FL 32608 (email: jeffroth@ufl.edu); Wasserman: Anderson School of Management, UCLA, 110 Westwood Plaza C521, Los Angeles, CA 90095 (email: melanie.wasserman@anderson.ucla.edu). Alexandre Mas was coeditor for this article. We thank Josh Angrist, Marianne Bertrand, Raj Chetty, John Ham, Nathan Hendren, Louis Kaplow, Mikael Lindahl, Jeremy Majerovitz, Richard Murnane, Jessica Pan, Kjell Salvanes, Till von Wachter, two anonymous referees, and numerous seminar participants for valuable suggestions that helped to improve the paper. Autor acknowledges support from the Russell Sage Foundation (grant 85-12-07). Figlio and Roth acknowledge support from the National Science Foundation and the Institute for Education Sciences (CALDER grant), and Figlio acknowledges support from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Wasserman acknowledges support from the NSF Graduation Research Fellowship, NIA grant T32-AG000186, and NICHD grant HD007339-30. We are grateful to the Florida Departments of Education and Health for providing the de-identified, matched data used in this analysis. The conclusions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not represent the positions of the Florida Departments of Education and Health or those of our funders.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 American Economic Association.
PY - 2019/7/1
Y1 - 2019/7/1
N2 - Boys born to disadvantaged families have higher rates of disciplinary problems, lower achievement scores, and fewer high school completions than girls from comparable backgrounds. Using birth certificates matched to schooling records for Florida children born 1992-2002, we find that family disadvantage disproportionately impedes the pre-market development of boys. The differential effect of family disadvantage on boys is robust to specifications within schools and neighborhoods as well as across siblings within families. Evidence supports that this is the effect of the postnatal environment; family disadvantage is unrelated to the gender gap in neonatal health. We conclude that the gender gap among black children is larger than among white children in substantial part because black children are raised in more disadvantaged families.
AB - Boys born to disadvantaged families have higher rates of disciplinary problems, lower achievement scores, and fewer high school completions than girls from comparable backgrounds. Using birth certificates matched to schooling records for Florida children born 1992-2002, we find that family disadvantage disproportionately impedes the pre-market development of boys. The differential effect of family disadvantage on boys is robust to specifications within schools and neighborhoods as well as across siblings within families. Evidence supports that this is the effect of the postnatal environment; family disadvantage is unrelated to the gender gap in neonatal health. We conclude that the gender gap among black children is larger than among white children in substantial part because black children are raised in more disadvantaged families.
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U2 - 10.1257/app.20170571
DO - 10.1257/app.20170571
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85068190079
VL - 11
SP - 338
EP - 381
JO - American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
JF - American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
SN - 1945-7782
IS - 3
ER -
