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In chapter two, we introduce gender ratios as a relatively under-exploited metric of fetal health and use it to estimate the causal impact of ambient prenatal pollution exposure on fetal deaths. Since a complete census of true fetal deaths is impossible to obtain, we exploit the differential in fetal susceptibility to environmental stressors across genders to estimate this effect. Males are more vulnerable to maternal stress in utero, and thus are more likely to suffer fetal death due to pollution exposure. We apply this metric in the context of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1970 (CAAA) which provide a source of exogenous variation in county-level ambient total suspended particulate matter (TSPs). We find that a one standard deviation increase in TSPs decreases the percentage of live births that are male by 1.6 percentage points. We then use the observed differences in neonatal and one-year mortality rates across genders in response to pollution exposure to estimate total fetal losses in utero. Our preferred calculations suggest the pollution reductions from the CAAA prevented approximately 59,000 fetal deaths in 1972.

In chapter three, we use draft lottery number assignment during the Vietnam Era as a natural experiment to examine the effects of military service on crime. Using exact dates of birth for inmates in state and federal prisons in 1979, 1986, and 1991, we find robust evidence of effects on violent crimes among whites. In particular, we find that draft eligibility increases incarceration rates for violent crimes by 14 to 19 percent. Correspondingly, two-sample instrumental variable estimates imply that military service increases the probability of incarceration for a violent crime by 0.27 percentage points. Results for nonwhites are not robust. We conduct two falsification tests, one that applies each of the three binding lotteries to unaffected cohorts and another that considers the effects of lotteries that were not used to draft servicemen.