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Childhood Circumstances and Young Adulthood Outcomes: The Role of Mothers’ Financial Problems

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  • Clark, Andrew E.
  • D'Ambrosio, Conchita
  • Barazzetta, Marta

Abstract

We here consider the cognitive and non-cognitive consequences on young adults of growing up with a mother who reported experiencing major financial problems. We use UK data from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children to show that early childhood financial problems are associated with worse adolescent cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes, controlling for both income and a set of standard variables, and in value-added models controlling for children’s earlier age-5 outcomes. The estimated effect of financial problems is almost always larger in size than that of income. Around one-quarter to one-half of the effect of financial problems on the non-cognitive outcomes seems to transit through mother’s mental health.

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  • Clark, Andrew E. & D'Ambrosio, Conchita & Barazzetta, Marta, 2019. "Childhood Circumstances and Young Adulthood Outcomes: The Role of Mothers’ Financial Problems," CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) 1902, CEPREMAP.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpm:docweb:1902
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    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. Chris Sampson’s journal round-up for 8th March 2021
      by Chris Sampson in The Academic Health Economists' Blog on 2021-03-08 12:00:01

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    1. Jessica L. Arnup & Nicole Black & David W. Johnston, 2022. "Changes in children’s time use during periods of financial hardship," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(3), pages 1133-1162, July.
    2. Andrew E. Clark & Conchita D'Ambrosio & Simone Ghislandi & Anthony Lepinteur & Giorgia Menta, 2021. "Maternal depression and child human capital: a genetic instrumental-variable approach," CEP Discussion Papers dp1749, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    3. Menta, Giorgia & Lepinteur, Anthony & Clark, Andrew E. & Ghislandi, Simone & D'Ambrosio, Conchita, 2023. "Maternal genetic risk for depression and child human capital," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    4. Walter Bossert & Andrew E Clark & Conchita D’Ambrosio & Anthony Lepinteur, 2023. "Economic insecurity and political preferences," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 75(3), pages 802-825.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Income; Financial Problems; Child Outcomes; Subjective well-being; Behaviour; Education; ALSPAC;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
    • I32 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Measurement and Analysis of Poverty
    • D60 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - General

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