Angela R. Fertig

The connection between maternal employment and childhood obesity: inspecting the mechanisms

This paper investigates the channels through which maternal employment affects childhood obesity. We use time diaries and interview responses from the Child Development Supplement of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics which combines information on children’s time allocation, children’s BMI, and mother’s labor force participation. We find some evidence that supervision and nutrition play significant but small roles in the relationship between maternal employment and childhood obesity. Although the difference in the effect of maternal employment varies by mother’s education, we find few differences in the mechanisms by mother’s education.

Homelessness among At‐Risk Families with Children in Twenty American Cities

This article uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study to explore the characteristics and determinants of homelessness among families with children. These unique data permit the examination of a large set of individual‐, household‐, and city‐level risk factors that may influence homelessness. Results suggest that homelessness is strongly linked to informal and institutional social support. It is only modestly associated with local housing and labor market conditions. These results suggest that the greatest potential for reducing family homelessness lies in interventions, such as low‐income housing assistance, that are designed to strengthen informal and institutional social support among low‐income mothers. Policies designed to alter local housing and labor market conditions are unlikely to reduce substantially the risk of this pressing social problem.

Minimum Drinking Age Laws and Infant Health Outcomes

Alcohol policies have potentially far-reaching impacts on risky sexual behavior, prenatal health behaviors, and subsequent outcomes for infants. After finding initial evidence in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) that changes in the minimum legal drinking age (MLDA) are related to prenatal drinking, we examine whether the drinking age influences birth outcomes. Using data from the National Vital Statistics (NVS) for the years 1978-1988, we find that a drinking age of 18 is associated with adverse outcomes among births to young mothers-including higher incidences of low birth weight and premature birth, but not congenital anomalies. The effects are largest among black women. We also report evidence that the MLDA laws alter the composition of births that occur. In states with lenient drinking laws, young black mothers are less likely to report paternal information on the birth certificate, particularly in states with restrictive abortion policies. The evidence suggests that lenient drinking laws generate poor birth outcomes in part because they increase the number of unplanned pregnancies.

Portfolio Choice and Mental Health

Close to 30% of the US population experiences at least one mental or substance abuse disorder each year. Given the prevalence of mental health issues, this paper analyzes the role of mental health and cognitive functioning in household portfolio choice decisions. Generally, we find that households affected by mental health issues decrease investments in risky instruments. Various mental health issues can reduce the probability of holding risky assets by up to 19%. Moreover, single women diagnosed with psychological disorders increase investments in safe assets. We also find that cognitive functioning issues are associated with an increase in financial assets devoted to retirement

Changes in Maternal Health and Health Behaviors as a Function of Homelessness

This longitudinal study examines the influence of homelessness on maternal health and health behaviors. Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, it follows 2,631 families from 20 large US cities over 5 years. Over that period, 9.8 percent of the sample reportedly experienced at least one homeless spell and an additional 23.6 percent experienced one or more doubled-up episodes. Estimated rates of disability, depression, and anxiety are two to three times higher for the homeless group than for those with no homeless spell. Mothers who become homeless are found to have poorer health outcomes both before and after homelessness. The study’s findings suggest that homelessness has a modest but distinct effect on maternal health outcomes. They also suggest that mothers who have young, low-income families and health problems, particularly behavioral health problems, can be promising targets for interventions designed to prevent or divert individuals from homelessness.

Connectedness and Expectations: How minority teachers can improve educational outcomes for minority students

Abstract Research in the field of representative bureaucracy provides evidence that the presence of minority teachers can improve educational outcomes for minority students. We test two possible mechanisms by examining if the presence of minority teachers increases how ‘connected’ minority students feel to their school and the students educational aspirations. Previous research has established a strong link between both of these factors and educational and non-educational outcomes. We find that increasing representation of African American and Latino/a teachers increases educational expectations for African American students, while increasing representation of Latino/a teachers increases school connectedness and educational expectations for Latino/a students.

Factors Contributing to the Receipt of Housing Assistance by Low-Income Families with Children in Twenty American Cities

The excess demand for housing assistance in the United States is well documented, but little is known about the factors that contribute to a family’s likeliness to receive housing assistance. This study tracks 3,237 low-income families in 20 large US cities over a 9-year study period to see which families would wind up receiving housing assistance. Thirty percent of the families subsequently received either public housing or voucher-based assistance. Families experiencing greater socioeconomic disadvantage and episodes of homelessness were more likely to receive housing assistance. Neighborhood characteristics were weakly associated with the receipt of housing, and health and criminal justice measures showed no associations with the likelihood of receiving housing assistance. Our findings show that housing assistance is a scarce resource that only reaches a minority of those who are eligible, but that the minority who do receive assistance is disproportionately composed of the most economically disadvantaged families.

Mental Health and Retirement Savings: Confounding Issues with Compounding Interest

The questionable ability of the U.S. pension system to provide for the growing elderly population combined with the rising number of people affected by depression and mental health problems magnifies the need to understand how household characteristics affect retirement. Mental health problems have a large and significant negative effect on retirement savings. Psychological distress decreases the probability of holding retirement accounts between 4 percent and 15 percent. Mental health problems can decrease retirement savings as a share of financial assets by over 40 percent. The magnitude of these effects suggests changes to employer management and government regulation of these accounts may be necessary.

Self-Employment and Mental Health

This paper analyzes the role of mental health in self-employment decisions. Using panel data, we find evidence of a causal relationship between mental health problems and self-employment. The relationship depends on the type of self-employment and severity of mental health issues. For men, having moderate psychological distress decreases the probability of being self-employed in an incorporated business between 1 and 3 percent and increases the probability of pursuing self-employment in an unincorporated business between 1 and 3 percent. For women, having moderate psychological distress increases the probability of pursuing self-employment in an unincorporated business between 1 and 2 percent. Further, our results suggest that individual difficulty in the wage-and-salary employment market is the likely mechanism for this connection between mental health and self-employment.

Public Housing & Health: Is there a connection?

This paper explores the relationship between public housing and health outcomes among low-income housing residents. While public housing can be dangerous and unhealthy environments to live, the subsidized rent may free up resources for nutritious food and health care. In addition, public housing may be of higher quality than the available alternatives, it may provide easier access to health clinics willing to serve the poor, and it may link residents to social support networks, which can improve mental health and the ability to access higher-quality grocery stores. To test whether there is a back-door health benefit to the public housing program, we analyze data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. We minimize the effects of selection into public housing with controls and instrumental variables estimation and find that public housing residence may reduce the mother’s probability of smoking. The other results are sensitive to the instrumental variable used, and thus, we conclude that, except with respect to smoking, we are unable to detect a robust health effect of public housing.