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The Impact of Car Pollution on Infant and Child Health: Evidence from Emissions Cheating

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  • Diane Alexander
  • Hannes Schwandt

Abstract

Car exhaust is a major source of air pollution, but little is known about its impacts on population health. We exploit the dispersion of emissions-cheating diesel cars?which secretly polluted up to 150 times as much as gasoline cars?across the United States from 2008-2015 as a natural experiment to measure the health impact of car pollution. Using the universe of vehicle registrations, we demonstrate that a 10 percent cheating-induced increase in car exhaust increases rates of low birth weight and acute asthma attacks among children by 1.9 and 8.0 percent, respectively. These health impacts occur at all pollution levels and across the entire socioeconomic spectrum.

Suggested Citation

  • Diane Alexander & Hannes Schwandt, 2019. "The Impact of Car Pollution on Infant and Child Health: Evidence from Emissions Cheating," Working Paper Series WP-2019-4, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedhwp:wp-2019-04
    DOI: 10.21033/wp-2019-04
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    2. Rüdiger Bachmann & Gabriel Ehrlich & Ying Fan & Dimitrije Ruzic & Benjamin Leard, 2023. "Firms and Collective Reputation: a Study of the Volkswagen Emissions Scandal," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 21(2), pages 484-525.
    3. Xinming Du & Shan Zhang & Eric Zou, 2024. "Marine Microplastics and Infant Health," NBER Working Papers 33094, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Osmis Areda Habte & Håkan J. Holm, 2022. "Competition Makes Inspectors More Lenient: Evidence from the Motor Vehicle Inspection Market," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 61(1), pages 45-72, August.
    5. Daniel Auer & Johannes S. Kunz, 2021. "Communication Barriers and Infant Health: Intergenerational Effects of Randomly Allocating Refugees Across Language Regions," Papers 2021-05, Centre for Health Economics, Monash University.
    6. Anupam Jena & David Slusky & Lilly Springer, 2023. "Occupational Hazard? An Analysis of Birth Outcomes Among Physician Mothers," NBER Working Papers 31955, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Babak Jahanshahi & Brian Johnston & Mark E. McGovern & Duncan McVicar & Dermot O’Reilly & Neil Rowland & Stavros Vlachos, 2024. "Prenatal exposure to particulate matter and infant birth outcomes: Evidence from a population‐wide database," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(9), pages 2182-2200, September.
    8. Li, Zheng & Jin, Bohan, 2024. "A breath of fresh air: Coal power plant closures and health in China," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    9. Ju, Heng & Tang, Yao & Zhang, Meilan, 2024. "Air Pollution's Grip: Drug Cost and Its Heterogeneity in China," MPRA Paper 121154, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Hill, Elaine L. & Ma, Lala, 2022. "Drinking water, fracking, and infant health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    11. Lucas Bretschger & Karen Pittel, 2020. "Twenty Key Challenges in Environmental and Resource Economics," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 77(4), pages 725-750, December.
    12. Margaryan, Shushanik, 2021. "Low emission zones and population health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    13. Hannah Klauber & Felix Holub & Nicolas Koch & Nico Pestel & Nolan Ritter & Alexander Rohlf, 2024. "Killing Prescriptions Softly: Low Emission Zones and Child Health from Birth to School," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 220-248, May.
    14. Tatyana Deryugina & Julian Reif, 2023. "The Long-run Effect of Air Pollution on Survival," NBER Working Papers 31858, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Ale-Chilet, Jorge & Chen, Cuicui & Li, Jing & Reynaert, Mathias, 2021. "Colluding Against Environmental Regulation," TSE Working Papers 21-1204, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    16. Hasan, Iftekhar & Noth, Felix & Tonzer, Lena, 2023. "Cultural norms and corporate fraud: Evidence from the Volkswagen scandal," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    17. Egle Sendzikiene & Violeta Makareviciene & Migle Santaraite, 2022. "Simultaneous Extraction of Rapeseed Oil and Enzymatic Transesterification with Butanol in the Mineral Diesel Medium," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(18), pages 1-12, September.
    18. Gharad Bryan & Edward Glaeser & Nick Tsivanidis, 2019. "Cities in the Developing World," NBER Working Papers 26390, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Aydin, Eren & Gehrsitz, Markus & Traxler, Christian, 2024. "Greener Fleet, Cleaner Air: How Low Emission Zones Reduce Pollution," IZA Discussion Papers 17144, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Nolan, Anne, 2023. "The healthcare costs of poor air quality in Ireland: An analysis of hospital admissions," Papers WP769, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    21. Lucas Bretschger & Karen Pittel, 2019. "Twenty Key Questions in Environmental and Resource Economics," CER-ETH Economics working paper series 19/328, CER-ETH - Center of Economic Research (CER-ETH) at ETH Zurich.
    22. Stefania Lovo & Samantha B. Rawlings, 2022. "The Health Burden of E-Waste: The Impact of E-Waste Dumping Sites on Child Mortality," CESifo Working Paper Series 9916, CESifo.
    23. Agarwal, Sumit & Han, Yajie & Qin, Yu & Zhu, Hongjia, 2023. "Disguised pollution: Industrial activities in the dark," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    24. Hasan, Iftekhar & Noth, Felix & Tonzer, Lena, 2019. "Thou shalt not bear false witness against your customers: Cultural norms and the Volkswagen scandal," IWH Discussion Papers 21/2019, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    25. Beshir, H.A.; & Fichera, E.;, 2022. "“And Breathe Normally†: The Low Emission Zone impacts on health and well-being in England," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 22/09, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Car pollution; emissions cheating; health; pollution;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • I14 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health and Inequality
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • K32 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law

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