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Childhood Nutrition and Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from a School Breakfast Program

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While a growing literature documents the short-term effects of public programs providing children with nutritious food, there is scarce evidence of the long-term effects of such programs. This paper studies the long-term consequences of access to nutritious food using the rollout of a free school breakfast program in Norwegian cities. This program provided children with nutritious food and replaced a hot school meal at the end of the day with similar caloric value but less micronutrients. Our results indicate that access to a nutritious school breakfast increases education by 0.1 years and earnings by 2-4 percent.

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  • Bütikofer, Aline & Mølland, Eirin & Salvanes, Kjell G., 2016. "Childhood Nutrition and Labor Market Outcomes: Evidence from a School Breakfast Program," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 15/2016, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:nhheco:2016_015
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    Cited by:

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    2. Daniel Borbely & Markus Gehrsitz & Stuart McIntyre & Gennaro Rossi, 2022. "Does the Provision of Universal Free School Meals Improve School Attendance and Behaviour?," Working Papers 22-5, University of Strathclyde Business School, Department of Economics.
    3. Marcus, Michelle & Yewell, Katherine G., 2022. "The Effect of Free School Meals on Household Food Purchases: Evidence from the Community Eligibility Provision," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    4. Gao, Yuan & Lopez, Rigoberto & Liao, Ruili & Liu, Xiaoou, 2021. "Public Health Shocks, Learning, and Persistent Diet Improvement," 2021 Conference, August 17-31, 2021, Virtual 314973, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    5. Fang, Guanfu & Zhu, Ying, 2022. "Long-term impacts of school nutrition: Evidence from China’s school meal reform," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Nutritious School breakfast; education; malnutrition; health;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs

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