The Long-Term Health Effects of Educational Expansion: Evidence from India's DPEP

Sammanfattning

Empirical research has sought to causally estimate the long-run effects of education on adult health behaviors worldwide. However, theexistingevidenceislargelyconcentratedindeveloped country contexts- primarily the U.S., U.K., and Scandinavia- with limited evidence from low and middle-income countries, particularly India. This study exploits the variation introduced by the District Primary Education Program (DPEP), which targeted districts with female literacy rates below the 1991 national average using a difference-in-difference approach with fixed effects. Using data from the 1991 Census and the National Family Health Survey (NFHS Round 4), I estimate the causal impact of DPEP on educational attainment and downstream effects on health and substance use outcomes using an Instrumental Variables approach. The study contributes to the literature by providing the first causal evidence on the relationship between schooling expansion and adult health outcomes in India. The results indicate that DPEP led to improvements in educational attainment but the effects on health and substance use behavior are very modest or close to zero.