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Source: Rand Corporation
Resulting in 11 citations.
1. Datar, Ashlesha
Kilburn, M. Rebecca
Loughran, David S.
Health Endowments and Parental Investments in Infancy and Early Childhood
Working Paper WR-367, RAND Labor and Population Working Paper Series, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, March 2006.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/2006/RAND_WR367.pdf
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT); Birthweight; Breastfeeding; Family Characteristics; Head Start; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading); Pre-natal Care/Exposure; Preschool Children; Siblings

This paper tests whether parents reinforce or compensate for child endowments. We employ birth weight as a proxy for endowments and estimate how the difference in birth weight across siblings impacts specific parental investments, including breastfeeding initiation and duration, well-baby visits, immunizations, preschool attendance, and kindergarten entry age. We also examine whether parental investment in a child is impacted by her siblings' endowments. Our results indicate that heavier birth weight children receive higher levels of most parental investment than their lower birth weight siblings suggesting that parental investments in infancy and early childhood reinforce differences in endowments. In one exception, we find weak evidence that lower birth weight children enter kindergarten slightly later than their normal birth weight siblings, which could be interpreted as a compensating parental investment. Presence of a low birth weight sibling in the household increases the likelihood of investments such as well-baby visits and immunizations.

We use data from the NLSY-C, which contains detailed information about the children born to female respondents of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79). We first restrict our sample to mothers with at least two children surveyed between 1986-2000 with birth weight information available for at least one child. Next, we only keep children for whom there is information on at least one of the parental investments examined in the paper. This reduces the sample to 10,000 children born to 3,660 mothers.

We exploit four key features of the NLSY-C for the purposes of this paper. First, the NLSY-C collects data on all children born to NLSY79 mothers, which allows us to examine intrafamily resource allocation decisions. Second, the NLSY-C collects data on birth weight for all surveyed children. The third key feature of the NLSY-C is that it collects information on a number of health and educational investments that parents make in their children starting in infancy and early childhood. Finally, the availability of information regarding maternal and family characteristics, and prenatal investments at the time of each sibling's birth is a unique feature of these data and allows us to control for such differences across siblings.

Our analyses consider the following investments:
(1) Initiation and duration (weeks) of breastfeeding
(2) Whether the child was taken for a well-baby visit in the first year after birth
(3) Whether the child received all doses of DPT and oral polio vaccines
(4) Whether the child attended preschool (including Head Start)
(5) Kindergarten entrance age (KEA) in months, and whether the child was held back
from entering kindergarten even after he or she was eligible

Bibliography Citation
Datar, Ashlesha, M. Rebecca Kilburn and David S. Loughran. "Health Endowments and Parental Investments in Infancy and Early Childhood." Working Paper WR-367, RAND Labor and Population Working Paper Series, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, March 2006.
2. Greenwell, Lisa
Leibowitz, Arleen A.
Klerman, Jacob Alex
Do Women's Early Work Commitment and Welfare Attitudes Predict Employment After Childbirth?
Working Paper DRU-427-1-NICHD, Santa Monica, CA, RAND, 1994.
Also: http://www.rand.org/labor/dru_archive.html
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT); Employment; Family Background and Culture; Fertility; First Birth; Maternal Employment; Self-Esteem; Welfare; Work Attitudes

In this study, the authors investigate women's work commitment and welfare attitudes in adolescence, and how these relate to women's employment status a year after their first childbirth. The authors find that willingness to combine family and work, rather than simply a desire to work, predicts employment a year after first childbirth, net of background and social psychological characteristics. Though women with welfare backgrounds are less likely to be subsequently employed, women's welfare attitudes are unrelated to their subsequent employment. These findings suggest that women's willingness to use welfare is compatible with work commitment, and with employment while an infant is present.
Bibliography Citation
Greenwell, Lisa, Arleen A. Leibowitz and Jacob Alex Klerman. "Do Women's Early Work Commitment and Welfare Attitudes Predict Employment After Childbirth?" Working Paper DRU-427-1-NICHD, Santa Monica, CA, RAND, 1994.
3. Hosek, James R.
Peterson, Christine E.
Enlistment Decisions of Young Men
Interim Report, The RAND Corporation, 1985
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Behavior; Educational Attainment; High School Completion/Graduates; Military Enlistment; Military Recruitment

This study analyzes factors in the enlistment decisions of two segments of the recruiting market: high school seniors, and nonstudent high school graduates. It draws on data from the 1979 Department of Defense Survey of personnel entering military service and from the 1979 wave of the NLSY. The authors base their empirical analysis on hypotheses derived from the theories of investment in human capital and career choice, and on the theory of recruiter behavior. They find that seniors and graduates differ substantially in the empirical determinants of their enlistment decisions; education of their enlistment decisions; education expectations play a major role in enlistment behavior; and a graduate's enlistment probability is much less in areas with a fairly high proportion of seniors and recent graduates, whereas a senior's enlistment probability is unaffected. [NTIS AD-A158-069-5-XAB]
Bibliography Citation
Hosek, James R. and Christine E. Peterson. "Enlistment Decisions of Young Men." Interim Report, The RAND Corporation, 1985.
4. Kilburn, M. Rebecca
Hanser, Lawrence M.
Klerman, Jacob Alex
Estimating AFQT Scores for National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS) Respondents
Rand Monograph, MR-818-OSD/A. Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation, 1998.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/2009/MR818.pdf
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT); Military Enlistment; Military Recruitment; National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP); National Education Longitudinal Survey (NELS); Test Scores/Test theory/IRT

This is the first report of a two-part project that estimates the determinants of individual enlistment decisions using the 1992 and 1994 waves of the National Educational Longitudinal Survey (NELS). The authors impute AFQT scores for NELS respondents using test scores reported in the 1992 NELS, test score trends from the 1978-1992 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), and the sample in the 1980 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) that was used to norm the AFQT. Percentile scores on the NELS tests are equated to percentile scores on the AFQT in the NLSY with an adjustment to reflect test score trends observed in the NAEP over the period between 1980 and 1992. In addition to imputing AFQT scores for NELS respondents, the authors examine test score trends between 1980 and 1992 to draw implications for recruiting policy. There appears to be no justification for any concerns that a rising share of minorities in the youth population will result in a decline in the pot ential supply of youth. Even though minorities in the early 1990s continued to score lower than average on the AFQT, the growth in their population share was outweighed by their greater-than-average test score growth during the 1980s and early 1990s. The net result of these countervailing trends was that a larger fraction of minorities was estimated to be high-quality potential recruits and that the share of the entire senior population scoring in that range was largely unchanged.
Bibliography Citation
Kilburn, M. Rebecca, Lawrence M. Hanser and Jacob Alex Klerman. Estimating AFQT Scores for National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS) Respondents. Rand Monograph, MR-818-OSD/A. Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation, 1998..
5. Leibowitz, Arleen A.
Klerman, Jacob Alex
Waite, Linda J.
Employment of New Mothers and Child Care Choice: Differences by Children's Age
Working Paper RAND Publication RP-119, The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica CA, February 1990.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/reprints/RP119/
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Child Care; Educational Attainment; Employment; Family Income; First Birth; Labor Force Participation; Maternal Employment; Mothers; Wages

This paper examines a woman's decisions about when to return to market work in the two years following childbirth and the type of child care she chooses. Own wages relate positively to an early return to work, while higher family income delays return to work. Wages and income did not significantly affect choice of market versus nonmarket child care. Greater child care tax credits increased early return to work (within three months) but had little effect on later labor supply. Contrary to expectations, tax credits did not affect child care choice, but predicted early market reentry.
Bibliography Citation
Leibowitz, Arleen A., Jacob Alex Klerman and Linda J. Waite. "Employment of New Mothers and Child Care Choice: Differences by Children's Age." Working Paper RAND Publication RP-119, The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica CA, February 1990.
6. Li, Jui-Chung Allen
The Kids Are OK: Divorce and Children's Behavior Problems
Working Paper WR-489, RAND Corporation, May 2007.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/2007/RAND_WR489.pdf
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Armed Forces Qualifications Test (AFQT); Behavior Problems Index (BPI); Children, Well-Being; Divorce; Gender Differences; Marital Disruption; Marital Status; Racial Differences

Although social scientists and commentators agree that parents should be responsible for their children's well-being and keep their children's interest in mind when they consider the possibility of ending a marriage, they disagree on how much the association between parental divorce and child well-being is causal. This paper reexamines the causal claim that parental divorce is detrimental to children's emotional well-being, measured in terms of behavior problems. I analyze panel data from the 1986-2002 waves of Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979. As in previous research, I find that parental divorce is associated with a higher level of behavior problems in children in the ordinary least squares regressions that adjust for observed factors. However, once I control for selection on unobserved factors that are either constant over time or change at a constant rate over time by using generalizations of the child fixed-effects model, the effect of divorce substantially declines and is no longer statistically significant. I conclude that children of divorce would have fared equally well/poor in terms of their emotional well-being if their parents had remained married.
Bibliography Citation
Li, Jui-Chung Allen. "The Kids Are OK: Divorce and Children's Behavior Problems." Working Paper WR-489, RAND Corporation, May 2007.
7. Loughran, David S.
Datar, Ashlesha
Kilburn, M. Rebecca
Interactive Effect of Birth Weight and Common Parental Investment on Child Test Scores
Working PaperWR-404, RAND Labor and Population Working Paper Series, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, July 2006
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Birthweight; Family Models; Family Size; Home Observation for Measurement of Environment (HOME); Maternal Employment; Modeling, Fixed Effects; Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Math); Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT- Reading); School Entry/Readiness; School Progress; Siblings; Test Scores/Test theory/IRT; Variables, Instrumental

The theoretical and empirical literature on intrahousehold resource allocation focuses on whether child-specific parental investments reinforce or compensate for a child's initial endowments. However, many parental investments, like housing and neighborhood quality and family structure, are shared wholly or in part among all children in a household. The empirical results of this paper imply that these common parental investments are more beneficial to relatively poorly endowed siblings, where birth weight proxies for endowments. This is especially true in relatively high-SES families.

Since we cannot comprehensively account for common parental investments with specific variables available in nationally representative data sets, like the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-Child file (NLSY-C), nor can we directly measure endowments, we employ an indirect approach in this paper to assess whether common parental investment reinforces or compensates for endowments. This approach compares estimates of the impact of birth weight, which we treat as an observed correlate of endowments, on child test scores derived from empirical specifications that employ between-family and within-family variation in our data.

Bibliography Citation
Loughran, David S., Ashlesha Datar and M. Rebecca Kilburn. "Interactive Effect of Birth Weight and Common Parental Investment on Child Test Scores." Working PaperWR-404, RAND Labor and Population Working Paper Series, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, July 2006.
8. Loughran, David S.
Zissimopoulos, Julie M.
Why Wait? The Effect of Marriage and Childbearing on the Wage Growth of Men and Women
Working Paper WR-482, RAND Labor and Population, RAND Corportation, Santa Monica, CA, March 2008.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/2008/RAND_WR482-1.pdf
Cohort(s): NLSY79, Young Men, Young Women
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Childbearing; Marriage; Wage Growth; Wages, Men; Wages, Women

We use data from the earlier and later cohorts of the NLSY to estimate the effect of marriage and childbearing on wages. Our estimates imply that marriage lowers female wages by between two and four percent in the year of marriage. Marriage also lowers the wage growth of men and women by about two and four percentage points, respectively. A first birth lowers female wages by between two and three percent, but has no effect on wage growth. Male wages are unaffected by childbearing. These findings suggest that early marriage and childbearing can lead to substantial decreases in lifetime earnings.
Bibliography Citation
Loughran, David S. and Julie M. Zissimopoulos. "Why Wait? The Effect of Marriage and Childbearing on the Wage Growth of Men and Women." Working Paper WR-482, RAND Labor and Population, RAND Corportation, Santa Monica, CA, March 2008.
9. Rand Corporation
Labor and Population Program. Job Continuity Among New Mothers
Research Brief RB-5032, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica CA, 2000.
Also: http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB5032/index1.html
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Benefits; Current Population Survey (CPS) / CPS-Fertility Supplement; Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO); Job Patterns; Leave, Family or Maternity/Paternity; Legislation; Training, On-the-Job; Wage Gap; Women

In the 1990s, the states and then the federal government enacted maternity-leave legislation. This legislation guaranteed to mothers the right, after a leave of limited duration, to return to their pre-leave employers at the same or equivalent positions. A recent presidential proposal even encourages states to use unemployment benefits to provide paid time off for new parents. Such initiatives were made in response to trends that showed the number of working mothers rising sharply in the past two decades. By protecting the right of new mothers to return to their previous jobs, maternity-leave statutes seek to help women benefit more from on-the-job training and to reduce the wage gap between mothers and women who have never had children. If maternity-leave initiatives are to fulfill their promise, it is important to understand the extent to which new mothers returned to their old jobs before the passage of such legislation. Jacob Alex Klerman and Arleen Leibowitz use data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) and the Current Population Survey (CPS) to analyze job continuity among new mothers prior to the federal Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA). They find that most women working full-time before pregnancy returned to work for the same employer after giving birth. They argue it is unlikely that maternity-leave legislation will have a major effect on job continuity for working mothers, since the attractiveness of a given job may change after a woman gives birth (e.g., such women may want jobs with flexible hours or on-site day care). Such legislation, however, may have other effects on women's lifetime labor market choices.
Bibliography Citation
Rand Corporation. "Labor and Population Program. Job Continuity Among New Mothers." Research Brief RB-5032, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica CA, 2000.
10. Yoon, Young-Hee
Waite, Linda J.
Converging Employment Patterns of Black, White, and Hispanic Women--Return to Work After First Birth
Working Paper, DRU-525-NICHD, Santa Monica CA, The Rand Corporation, October 1993
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Demography; Ethnic Differences; Ethnic Groups; Family Income; Fertility; First Birth; Hispanics; Human Capital; Maternal Employment; Racial Differences; Re-employment; Residence; Work Experience; Work Reentry

This study examines the determinants of women's return to work following the birth of their first child among white, black and Mexican-origin women to test the general hypothesis that previous racial differentials--observed during the later 1960s and early 1970s--in employment of new mothers have disappeared with changes in overall employment patterns of women. Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth show the expected pattern. Several important measures of a woman's human capital, such as value of time, job experience, and work role attitudes have similar effects in predicting postnatal force participation for the three groups. However, other human capital and demographic factors, especially education, family income other than the woman's earning, and residence in an urban area affect return to work differently for black and white mothers. The results are tied to changes in job characteristics, the economy, and the family.
Bibliography Citation
Yoon, Young-Hee and Linda J. Waite. "Converging Employment Patterns of Black, White, and Hispanic Women--Return to Work After First Birth." Working Paper, DRU-525-NICHD, Santa Monica CA, The Rand Corporation, October 1993.
11. Yoon, Young-Hee
Waite, Linda J.
Converging Employment Patterns of Black, White, and Hispanic Women, Return to Work After First Birth
RAND Publication, RP-299. Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 1996
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: RAND
Keyword(s): Employment; Ethnic Differences; Family Income; Fertility; First Birth; Hispanic Studies; Human Capital; Maternal Employment; Mothers, Education; Racial Differences; Re-employment; Residence; Work Experience

Originally published in: Journal of Marriage and the Family, v. 56, no. 1, Feb. 1994. This study examines the determinants of womens' return to work following the birth of their first child among white, black and Mexican-origin women to test the general hypothesis that previous racial differentials--observed during the later 1960s and early 1970s--in employment of new mothers have disappeared with changes in overall employment patterns of women. Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth show the expected pattern. Several important measures of a woman's human capital, such as value of time, job experience, and work role attitudes have similar effects in predicting postnatal force participation for the three groups. However, other human capital and demographic factors, especially education, family income other than the woman's earning, and residence in an urban area affect return to work differently for black and white mothers. The results are tied to changes in job characteristics, the economy, and the family.
Bibliography Citation
Yoon, Young-Hee and Linda J. Waite. Converging Employment Patterns of Black, White, and Hispanic Women, Return to Work After First Birth. RAND Publication, RP-299. Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 1996.