This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the link between suicidal behaviors and human capital formation of young adults in the United States. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we estimate the effects of suicide thoughts and attempts on the probability of engaging in work or school. The richness of the data set allows us to implement several strategies to control for unobserved heterogeneity and the potential reverse causality. These include using a large set of control variables that are likely to be correlated with both suicidal behavior and the outcome measures, an instrumental variables method, and a fixed effects analysis from the subsample of twin pairs contained in the data. The longitudinal nature of the data set also allows us to control for past suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts of the individuals from their high school years as well as the suicidal behavior of their family members. Results from the different identification strategies consistently indicate that both suicide thoughts and suicide attempts decrease the likelihood a young adult individual engages in work or schooling.
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
11238.
Length: Date of creation: Apr 2005 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11238
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Find related papers by JEL classification: I1 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
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References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
David M. Cutler & Edward L. Glaeser & Karen E. Norberg, 2001.
"Explaining the Rise in Youth Suicide,"
NBER Chapters,
in: Risky Behavior among Youths: An Economic Analysis, pages 219-270
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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Angrist, Joshua D. & Krueger, Alan B., 1999.
"Empirical strategies in labor economics,"
Handbook of Labor Economics,
in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 23, pages 1277-1366
Elsevier.
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