Environment, Health, and Human Capital

T recognition that environmental factors can affect human health can be traced at least as far back as the thirteenth century when the King of England banned the burning of sea-coal in London because it was “prejudicial to health” (Brimblecombe 1999). In the eight-hundred years that have followed, our understanding of biology, chemistry, and medicine have evolved considerably. Alongside large-scale increases in pollution due to industrialization, modern environmental concerns were born. Today, nearly every country in the world regulates the environment to some degree, and pollution is a canonical example of both externalities and public goods in microeconomic textbooks.1 The principal motivation for environmental regulation is the protection