We use instrumental variable methods to investigate whether the impact of parental smoking habits on their children's smoking decisions is a causal one. We find evidence of same-sex role models in two-parent households: mothers play a crucial role in determining their daughters' smoking...

We analyze data from the 1994-2002 waves of the British Household Panel Survey to explore the influence of parental smoking habits on their children's smoking decisions. In order to account for the potential endogeneity of parental smoking habits we use instrumental variable methods. We find...

In this paper we analyse data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 to investigate whether experiencing parental divorce during adolescence reduces measured cognitive ability. To account for the potential endogeneity of parental divorce we employ a difference-in-differences...

We analyze the impact of unexpected health shocks—defined as the sudden diagnosis of cancer, stroke, or heart attack—on the probability of couple dissolution using longitudinal representative data on older individuals (50+). We leverage the longitudinal nature of the HRS and utilize a...

We analyze the impact of unexpected health shocks–defined as the sudden diagnosis of cancer, stroke, or heart attack–on the probability of couple dissolution using longitudinal representative data on older individuals (50+). We leverage the longitudinal nature of the HRS and utilize a...

We use data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health to investigate whether the quality of tertiary education -measured by college selectivity- causally affects obesity prevalence in the medium run (by age 24-34) and in the longer run (about 10 years later). We use...

Utilizing comprehensive administrative data from Brazil, we investigate the impact of peer effects on wages, considering both within-gender and cross-gender dynamics. Since the average productivity of both individuals and their peers is unobservable, we estimate these values using worker fixed...

The increasing incidence of ADHD diagnosis and its uneven prevalence across demographic groups has sparked debates about misdiagnosis. We use data on individuals' genetic predisposition to ADHD from the Add Health survey of U.S. schools to uncover relative standards in ADHD diagnosis. We...

We provide comparable evidence on the patterns and trends in obesity across the Atlantic and analyse whether there are economic rationales for public intervention to control obesity. We take into account equity issues as well as efficiency considerations, which are organized around three...

This paper uses longitudinal micro-evidence from the European Community Household Panel to investigate the obesity phenomenon in nine EU countries from 1998 to 2001. The author documents cross-country prevalence, trends and cohort-age profiles of obesity among adults and analyses the...