University of Pittsburgh, IZA, United States.
J Health Econ. 2017 Jul;54:1-16. doi: 10.1016/j.jhealeco.2017.03.002. Epub 2017 Mar 18.
This study uses a unique dataset linking the birth records of two generations of children born in California and Florida (1970-2009) to analyze the mechanisms behind the generational decline observed in birth outcomes of children of Mexican origin. Calibrating a simple model of intergenerational transmission of birth weight, I show that modest positive selection on health at the time of migration can account for the initial advantage in birth outcomes of second-generation Mexicans. Moreover, accounting for the socioeconomic differences between second-generation Mexicans and white natives and the observed intergenerational correlation in birth weight, the model predicts a greater deterioration than that observed in the data. Using a subset of siblings and holding constant grandmother quasi-fixed effects, I show that the persistence of healthier behaviors among second-generation Mexican mothers can explain more than half of the difference between the model prediction and the observed birth outcomes of third-generation Mexicans.
本研究利用一个独特的数据集，将加利福尼亚州和佛罗里达州两代儿童（1970-2009 年）的出生记录联系起来，分析了观察到的墨西哥裔儿童出生结果代际下降背后的机制。通过校准一个简单的出生体重代际传递模型，我表明，在移民时对健康进行适度的正向选择，可以解释第二代墨西哥人的出生结果最初的优势。此外，考虑到第二代墨西哥人与白人本土居民之间的社会经济差异，以及观察到的出生体重代际相关性，该模型预测的恶化程度大于数据中观察到的程度。通过使用兄弟姐妹的子集，并固定祖母准固定效应，我表明，第二代墨西哥裔母亲中更健康行为的持续存在，可以解释模型预测与第三代墨西哥裔出生结果之间差异的一半以上。
