In this paper we show that it may be optimal for individuals to educate more and decrease future labor supply (choose earlier retirement) when life expectancy increases. This result reconciles the findings of Hazan [Hazan, M., 2009. Longevity and Lifetime Labor Supply: Evidence and Implications....

This research documents that the growth rate of life expectancy over the 20th century decreased the growth rate of per capita GDP and the growth rate of population. Exploiting exogenous variation in life expectancy from mid-20th century medical advances (e.g., antibiotics), the analysis...

This study documents that the growth in life expectancy over the 20th century decreased per capita GDP growth and increased population growth. By exploiting significant advances in medical technologies, starting to diffuse in the 1940s, the analysis establishes that countries with higher levels...

This paper studies the impact of the first effective medical treatment for an infectious disease -diphtheria antitoxin- on the historical health transition in the United States. Using an instrumental variable for local antitoxin adoption rates and information from approximately 1.6 million death...

Fears of immigrants as a threat to public health have a long and sordid history. At the turn of the 20th century, when millions of immigrants crowded into dense American cities, contemporaries blamed the high urban mortality penalty on the newest arrivals. Nativist sentiments eventually led to...