| 1. |
- Aalto, Aino-Maija, et al.
(författare)
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Childcare - A safety net for children?
- 2018
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- We analyze how access to childcare affects health outcomes of children with unemployed parents using a reform that increased childcare access in some Swedish municipalities. For 4–5 year olds, we find an immediate increase in infection-related hospitalization, when these children first get access to childcare. We find no effect on younger children. When children are 10–11 years of age, children who did not have access to childcare when parents were unemployed are more likely to take medication for respiratory conditions. Taken together, our results thus suggest that access to childcare exposes children to risks for infections, but that need for medication in school age is lower for children who had access.
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| 2. |
- Aalto, Aino-Maija
(författare)
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Incentives and Inequalities in Family and Working Life
- 2018
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Essay I: Same-gender teachers may affect educational preferences by acting as role models for their students. I study the importance of the gender composition of teachers in math and science during lower secondary school on the likelihood to continue in math-intensive tracks in the next levels of education. I use population wide register data from Sweden and control for family fixed effects to account for sorting into schools. According to my results, the gender gap in graduating with a math-intensive track in upper secondary school would decrease by 16 percent if the share of female math and science teachers would be changed from none to all at lower secondary school. The gap in math-related university degrees would decrease by 22 percent from the same treatment. The performance is not affected by the higher share of female science teachers, only the likelihood to choose science, suggesting that the effects arise because female teachers serve as role models for female students.
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| 3. |
- Aalto, Aino-Maija
(författare)
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The (in)effectiveness of financial incentive on fertility behaviour : Childcare –a safety net for children?
- 2017
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Is childcare a safety net for vulnerable children? This paper investigates the role of childcare for the health outcomes of children whose parents are unemployed. Exploiting time variation in childcare access resulting from a reform requiring Swedish municipalities to provide childcare also for children with unemployed parents, we estimate causal effects on health, as measured by register data on hospitalizations. We find that access to childcare reduced hospitalizations for infections among toddlers, especially among boys. Among children in preschool age access to childcare caused a temporary increase in hospitalization for infections the year they got access to childcare.
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| 4. |
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| 5. |
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| 6. |
- Andersen, Torben, et al.
(författare)
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Svensk Finanspolitik
- 2011
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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| 7. |
- Andersen, Torben, et al.
(författare)
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Swedish Fiscal Policy
- 2011
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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| 8. |
- Björkegren, Evelina, et al.
(författare)
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Birth order and health disparities throughout the life course
- 2023
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Ingår i: Social Science and Medicine. - : Elsevier BV. - 0277-9536 .- 1873-5347. ; 318
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Background: Research has shown ample evidence of how birth order affects health; however, these studies focus on specific health outcomes and ages.ObjectiveWe provide a comprehensive picture of the effects of birth order on health disparities over the life course.Method: We study the effects of birth order from birth to age 70 on hospitalizations, visits to open care facilities and mortality using Swedish register data from 1987 to 2016. We identify the effects by comparing siblings within the same family.Results: We find that firstborns have worse health at birth. In adolescence, the birth-order effects switch direction, and younger siblings are more likely to be hospitalized and visit open care facilities. From early age younger siblings receive more care for injuries, in adolescence for drug and alcohol abuse, and from middle age for diseases of the circulatory system compared to older siblings. Younger siblings also stay longer in hospital. Age 0–2, younger siblings are more likely to be hospitalized for infections, diseases of the respiratory system, eyes and ears, whereas the pattern is the opposite for children age 3–6. Firstborns are more likely to receive care for depression and ADHD in childhood and endocrine diseases after age 50.Interpretation: Birth order affects health over the life-cycle and this is likely due to biological factors as well as parental behavior and the family environment. Firstborns have worse health at birth, but in adolescence the effects switch direction due to health issues related to younger siblings engaging in more risky behavior. For small children, having siblings at home increases the risk of being hospitalized for infections, diseases of the respiratory system, eyes and ears. The adverse conditions in utero for firstborns may be the cause of increased risk of metabolic syndromes such as obesity and diabetes later in life.
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| 9. |
- Björkegren, Evelina
(författare)
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Family, Neighborhoods, and Health : Conditions for the Development of Human Capabilities
- 2017
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Essay 1: We use data from a large sample of adoptees born in Sweden to decompose the intergenerational persistence in health inequality across generations into one pre-birth component, measured by the biological parents’ longevity, and one post-birth component, measured by the adopting parents’ longevity. We find that most of the health inequality is transmitted via pre-birth factors. In the second part of the paper, we study the background to why children of parents with better educational attainments have better health by decomposing the association into one component attributed to the education of the biological parents and one to the adopting ones. We find that the association can mostly be attributed to the adopting parents, suggesting that parental resources per se, rather than pre-birth (genetic) differences, make up the parental education gradient in child health.Essay 2: There are large differences in health across neighborhoods in Sweden. To try to answer if there is a causal link between neighborhood conditions in childhood and youth health, I apply two different empirical strategies. First, I use population wide data on families living in different areas in Sweden, and estimate the effects of childhood neighborhood on youth health using data on families that move across the country. Since the choice of moving and where to live is endogenous, I exploit the timing of moves and estimate the effect of siblings’ different exposure time to neighborhoods. The second approach utilizes a governmental policy that assigned refugees to their initial neighborhood in Sweden, potentially offering exogenous variation in neighborhoods and allowing me to study the effect of different neighborhoods on youth health. The findings from the two strategies together imply that there are significant neighborhood effects on youth health, but that the effects are contemporaneous and there is no evidence of exposure time effects.Essay 3: Previous research has shown that birth order affects outcomes such as educational achievements, IQ and earnings. The mechanisms behind these effects are still largely unknown. We examine birth order effects on health, and whether health at young age could be a transmission channel for birth order effects observed later in life. Our results show that firstborn children have worse health at birth. This disadvantage is reversed in early age and later-born siblings are more likely to be hospitalized for injuries and avoidable conditions. In adolescence and as young adults, younger siblings are more likely to be of poor mental health and to be admitted to hospital for alcohol induced health conditions. We also test for reverse causality by estimating fertility responses to the health of existing children. Overall our results suggest that birth order effects are due to differential parental investment because parents’ time and resources are limited.Essay 4: We study the short-, medium- and long-term consequences of health at birth using administrative data from Sweden for individuals born in the years 1973-1979. We contribute to a better understanding of the consequences of early life health by contrasting the effects of birth weight with two other measures of neonatal health: the length and the head circumference of the newborn. Our findings suggest that the use of birth weight alone might lead to an underestimation of the importance of early health. Furthermore, we find that there is a persistent effect of neonatal health on a variety of human capital measures in adolescence and adulthood.
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| 10. |
- Björkegren, Evelina, et al.
(författare)
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Är det bättre att vara storasyskon?
- 2018
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Ingår i: Ekonomisk Debatt. ; 46:5, s. 38-50
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Tidskriftsartikel (populärvet., debatt m.m.)abstract
- Det hävdas ofta att storasyskon skulle vara mer ansvarsfyllda, eller att småsyskon skulle vara mer kreativa. Hur man påverkas av platsen i syskonskaran har också gett upphov till en omfattande forskningslitteratur. En stor del av forskningen präglas emellertid av små urval och otillräcklig information om familjen. I den här artikeln presenteras resultaten från våra egna studier av syskonordningens betydelse för individers hälsa och personlighet. Vi diskuterar även möjliga mekanismer bakom syskonordningseffekter och vilka data som krävs för att kunna fastställa trovärdiga orsakssamband.
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