Using Genetic Lotteries within Families to Examine the Causal Impact of Poor Health on Academic Achievement

One of the most robust relationships in the social sciences is the large positive correlation between health and education, but establishing a causal link remains a substantial challenge. This paper exploits di¤erences in genetic inheritance among children within the same family to estimate the impact of several poor health conditions on academic outcomes. We present evidence of large impacts of poor mental health on academic achievement. Our estimates suggest that accounting for family …xed e¤ects is important but these strategies cannot fully account for the endogeneity of poor heath. Finally, our results demonstrate that the presence of comorbid conditions presents immense challenges for empirical studies that aim to estimate the impact of speci…c health conditions. We are grateful to Weili Ding, Robert McMillan, John Mullahy, Jody Sindelar and participants at the 2007 NBER Summer Institute, Yale Health Policy Colloquium, University of British Columbia, University of Connecticut, University of Tennessee, University of Toronto and Simon Fraser University for comments and suggestions that have improved this paper. We are both grateful to the CLSRN for research support. Lehrer also wishes to thank SSHRC for additional research support. We are responsible for all errors. yThis research uses data from Add Health, a program project designed by J. Richard Udry, Peter S. Bearman, and Kathleen Mullan Harris, and funded by a grant P01-HD31921 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, with cooperative funding from 17 other agencies. Special acknowledgment is due Ronald R. Rindfuss and Barbara Entwisle for assistance in the original design. Persons interested in obtaining data …les from Add Health should contact Add Health, Carolina Population Center, 123 W. Franklin Street, Chapel Hill, NC 27516-2524 ([email protected]).