Targeting Investments in Children ─ Fighting Poverty When Resources Are Limited

Taking an empirical economics perspective, this volume assesses the causal impacts of disadvantage on youth outcomes and how policy interventions can alleviate those impacts. Each chapter develops a framework to describe the relationship between youth disadvantages and later life outcomes, addressing such factors as educational opportunity, health, neighborhood crime rates, and employment. This book documents the serious short- and long-term consequences of childhood disadvantage and provides nuanced evidence of the impact of public policy designed to help needy children.

This volume offers comparative analysis from twelve countries and examines the issue of age in the labor force. Contributors analyze the relationship between incentives to retire and the proportion of older persons in the workforce, the effects that reforming social security would have on the employment rates of older workers, and how extending labor force participation will affect program costs. Dispelling the myth that employing older workers takes jobs away from the young, this timely volume challenges many existing assumptions about the relationship between old and young people in the workforce.

In less than three decades, China has grown from playing a negligible role in world trade to being one of the world's largest exporters, a substantial importer of raw materials, intermediate outputs, and other goods, and both a recipient and a source of foreign investment. This volume undertakes an empirical investigation of the effects of China's new status, providing detailed analyses of the microstructure of trade, the macroeconomic implications, sector-level issues, and foreign direct investment. Careful examination of micro data in light of established economic theories clarifies a number of misconceptions, overturns some conventional wisdom, and documents data patters that enhance our understanding of issues related to China's trade.

A substantial number of American children experince poverty: about 17 percent of those under the age of eighteen meet the government's definition, and the proportion is even greater within minority groups. Childhood poverty can have lifelong effects, resulting in poor educational, labor market, and physical and mental and mental health outcomes for adults. These problems have long been recognized, and there are numerous programs designed to alleviate or even eliminate poverty; as these programs compete for scarce resources, it is important to develop a clear view of their impact as tools for poverty alleviation.

Targeting Investments in Children tackles the problem of evaluating these programs by examining them using a common metric: their impact on earnings in adulthood. The volume's contributors explore a variety of issues, such as the effect of interventions targeted at children of different ages, and study a range of programs, including child care, after-school care, and drug prevention. The results will be invaluable to educational leaders and researchers as well as policy makers.

Phillip B. Levine is the Class of 1919 Professor and chair of the Department of Economics at Wellesley College and a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
David J. Zimmerman is professor of economics and the Orrin Sage Professor of Political Economy at Williams College and a Research associate of the NBER.